American Gothic Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

American Gothic - Essay ExampleAmerican Gothic is a highly communicative painting which captures the spirit of an age. Depicting a Midwestern farmer and his daughter, the dour expressions of the faces of both father and daughter, their highly modest clothing and the conservatism which they exude, communicate the severity of the times. Whether from the modesty of their clothing, the utter dourness of their expression or the plainness of the house in the background, the picture tells the story of an age. It is an age where people lived by their own labor and had to movement long hours, leaving hardly any room for pleasurable pursuits, just to survive and make ends meet. Certainly, the picture does not tell a tale of exiguity but it tells one of a life of work with no pleasure in order to satisfy the basic requirements of livelihood, decent clothing and shelter.The painting only provides readers with an understanding of male-female relations and roles during the age in question. In this picture, the farmer is pictured holding a large pitchfork and dominates the painting. His daughter is standing just poop him and while he is looking straight ahead, gazing at onlookers, her look are averted. The pitchfork is a symbol of the manual labor for which men were responsible and the concomitant that the daughter is standing behind the father is indicative of the subservient status of females. Added to that, the fact that the man is looking straight ahead and the daughters eyes are averted could be interpreted as evidencing the public role of men versus the private role of females. It is, thus, that the male figure is boldly looking at the catamount and, hence, directly at us while the female figure is not.