What was American GOthic really a painting of?
A Harvard professor offers some observations on the art masterpiece “American Gothic.” Maybe they are disturbing. Maybe Dr. Biel is truly disturbed. The Occult Underground will judge for itself….
>>>>Then there are the creepy parts. The word gothic, of course, holds several meanings. One of them is architectural, and in the context of Wood’s painting it would seem to refer to the pointed window on the house. But gothic also alludes to the barbaric Goths, and the word gave itself to a brand of literature associated with hidden vices and morbid terror. Throw into this wicked brew a common observation about the painting — the woman looks younger than the man, to the extent that she could be his daughter rather than his wife — and we have the makings of a steamy potboiler for the lit-crit crowd. “Could the woman, dwelling in the lonely house in the cornfields or on the edge of town, be both ‘wife’ and daughter?” wonders Biel. “Does the pitchfork signify something secret, dark, satanic?”
Just what does that pitchfork stand for, anyway?
I remember seeing a splatterpunk parody of American Gothic on the cover of an American horror anthology–one that held the first Lovecraft story I ever read, “Pickman’s Model.”
I’ve always thought the woman was supposed to be the daughter, just compressed and aged, unable to leave her overprotective and puritan life for any number of reasons.
A life you hate – you hate it so much it’s aging you. It’s a life that you can escape any time, but you dare not ever leave – that’s scary.
theres a shadow of another person in the window