American Gothic, Grant Wood’s portrait of a farmer and his unwed daughter in the agrarian Midwest, is one of America’s most famous paintings. The dour visages and stark, Northern Renaissance-influenced style ushered in the Regionalist period later parodied through the ages of pop culture. And now, it’s back, this time not just spoofed, but completely ripped off in a three-dimensional version called “God Bless America” in Chicago’s Pioneer Plaza. Whether you see Wood’s original painting as a satire of repressed Midwestern society or a glorification of its moral virtue, we doubt any of the visitors posing for pictures aside the sculpture are analyzing it much at all. Though perhaps, in the grand scheme of public art, that’s not such a bad thing. Read More »