{"id":1014,"date":"2009-09-06T01:05:28","date_gmt":"2009-09-06T08:05:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp\/2009\/09\/nathan_dipietro_salutes_grant_1\/"},"modified":"2009-09-06T01:05:28","modified_gmt":"2009-09-06T08:05:28","slug":"nathan_dipietro_salutes_grant_1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/2009\/09\/nathan_dipietro_salutes_grant_1.html","title":{"rendered":"Nathan DiPietro salutes Grant Wood"},"content":{"rendered":"

(Below, Grant Wood<\/a>, The Birthplace of Herbert Hoover<\/i>, 1931, painted a year after American Gothic<\/i>.)<\/p>\n

Thanks to the Depression, Hoover was one of the most despised men in
\nAmerica, but not by an America First, bread-basket regionalist like
\nWood.<\/p>\n

\"grantwoodhoov.jpg\"<\/span>In
\nthe end, his celebrations of his region transcended it. He might have
\nbeen a narrow man, but as a painter, the fine-lined, lyrical urbanity
\nof his landscapes remains a marvel. With a paint brush in his hand,
\nWood had rhythm, and Wood had swing.<\/p>\n

Within the utter control of Wood’s manicured grounds is an antic
\nspirit. If Betty Boop came out the back door of his happy Hooverville
\nto sing on the lawn and all the trees and shrubs swayed in chorus, who
\nwould be surprised?<\/p>\n

Artists honor the past by improvising on it in the present. Currently at Punch Gallery<\/a> are Nathan DiPietro<\/a>‘s small paintings in a series titled, Neo-Suburban Palouse<\/span><\/i>, an exploration of Wood’s duality painted in the round on egg tempera on panel. <\/p>\n

\"NathanDiPietroGWod.jpg\"<\/span>The
\nfantasy maple<\/strike> oak on Wood’s lower left has an echo in the fantasy maple on
\nDePietro’s <\/strike>DiPietro’s lower right, a painting titled as a tip off, After the Birthplace of Herbert<\/i>.
\nWood’s trees have a lollipop sensibility, but DiPietro’s are space
\nships colored like Necco Wafers. They only pretend to toe the line in
\nrural red America. <\/p>\n

(DiPietro detail)
\"NathanDiPietroHoovde.jpg\"<\/span>“Give
\nme liberty or give me death,” said Patrick Henry. Why is it that the
\nright who treat Henry as a saint seem to long for surveillance? Its
\nmembers can’t wait to knuckle under, to be vulnerable to wiretap
\nwithout warrant, told what they can read, whom they can (and can’t)
\nsleep with and when they have to have children.<\/p>\n

From the point
\nof view of its proponents, what would a society regulated by the right
\nlook like? Wild nature would be gone, but tidy plots and man-made lakes
\nwould shine in the sun.<\/p>\n

\"NathanDiPietrolake.jpg\"<\/span>(Above, DiPietro’s Lakeside<\/i>. )<\/p>\n

Another Wood link: Wood loved the pre-Renaissance Italian painters, especially Duccio<\/a>,
\nwho modeled his mountains on rocks in his studio and populated his
\nground with strange little trees. There’s more of the Duccio feeling in
\nDiPietro than in Wood. It’s only a matter of time before DiPietro
\npaints Jesus in the Suburbs<\/i>. Through Sept 26.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Below, Grant Wood, The Birthplace of Herbert Hoover, 1931, painted a year after American Gothic.) Thanks to the Depression, Hoover was one of the most despised men in America, but not by an America First, bread-basket regionalist like Wood. In the end, his celebrations of his region transcended it. He might have been a narrow […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1014","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1014\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}