The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and the Battle For America

Ichabod Pursued by the Headless Horseman, 1849, F.O.C. Darley. The "dark forest," as we see in this image, will always symbolize a soul in the turmoil of temptation and sin: please note how knotted, broken and twisted the stylized trees are in this image. Because the climax of the story takes place within a forest, we are right to interpret this element of the story as revealing why Ichabod Crane is hunted by the Headless Horseman: Ichabod hasn't cultivated the "tree" of the Cross, true Redemption, rather, he has invoked superstitions to protect him and ward off evil, which works in just the opposite manner and, instead, invites evil, such as the Headless Horseman. The twisted forest then, is a manifestation of the sin upon Ichabod's soul, because we see the dead trees rather than the living tree of the Cross in his actions.

Washington Irving's famed tale The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (complete text HERE) was considered at the time, and still today, to be the first real piece of American literature written and, given all the versions and variations the story has given birth to, I would like to suggest it is because the story was the first to define what would prove to be the primary struggle in America:  religion and politics.

The Headless Horseman Pursuing Ichabod Crane, by John Quidor, 1858. In this image, the artist has invoked two great oppositions: life and death, light and darkness. Please note where Ichabod's horse is heading, into a patch of darkness, rather than the light from where he appears to be coming. Secondly, we see plenty of dead trees and limbs because there are so many living trees and brush in the painting. The dead trees, again, invoke that Ichabod hasn't been a true Christian honoring the Cross of Jesus, rather, he has followed his own little religion that has resulted in the death of his soul.

The name Ichabod is Hebrew for "God's glory has departed."  The wife of Phinehas had given birth to a son; when she heard that Phinehas had died, and that the Ark had been captured by the Philistines, she named her son "Ichabod" and then died herself, leaving her son an orphan.  Not a very promising omen.

The Indian Sarus Crane with long legs and neck. 

Ichabod's last name, Crane, invokes the bird for at least three reasons:  cranes are opportunistic feeders (Ichabod is always eating), they put on elaborate mating dances (Irving writes that "Ichabod prided himself on his dancing") and Irving makes it clear that Ichabod looks like a crane:

The cognomen of Crane was not inapplicable to his person. He was tall, but exceedingly lank, with narrow shoulders, long arms and legs, hands that dangled a mile out of his sleeves, feet that might have served for shovels, and his whole frame most loosely hung together. His head was small, and flat at top, with huge ears, large green glassy eyes, and a long snipe nose, so that it looked like a weather-cock perched upon his spindle neck to tell which way the wind blew. To see him striding along the profile of a hill on a windy day, with his clothes bagging and fluttering about him, one might have mistaken him for the genius of famine descending upon the earth, or some scarecrow eloped from a cornfield.

Symbols associated with Ichabod are generally religious in nature, however, Irving skews them in such a way that we know Ichabod is not a "holy figure" (he is compared to the "genius of famine," or one of the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse from the Book of Revelation).  Birds are symbolic embodiments of the Holy Spirit, for example, but Irving draws upon the unfavorable qualities of the "crane" to contrast with the gentleness of the Dove which descended at Christ's Baptism.

The Four Horseman of the Apocalypse with "Famine" on the black horse. 

Later in the story, Ichabod rides the horse Gunpowder and tries to outrun the Headless Horseman.  The horse in general, likewise, is usually associated with the Holy Spirit because the strength and nobility of the animal is a symbol of the heart as well and it is by the power of the Holy Spirit that our hearts are formed.

St. George slaying the dragon with the Virgin Mary praying
for him in the upper right corner, the mansion awaiting
him in heaven above her and the dragon in the lower
right/center, by Gustave Moreau. 

In the stories of St. George slaying the dragon, the horse depicts the Saint's heart and soul; St. George and his horse "become one" as the heart and soul become one, as the Saint becomes one with God's Will.   The importance of the horse can now be seen in comparison with Ichabod's rival, Brom Bones, of whom Irivng writes:

From his Herculean frame and great powers of limb he had received the nickname of BROM BONES, by which he was universally known. He was famed for great knowledge and skill in horsemanship, being as dexterous on horseback as a Tartar. He was foremost at all races and cock fights; and, with the ascendancy which bodily strength always acquires in rustic life, was the umpire in all disputes, setting his hat on one side, and giving his decisions with an air and tone that admitted of no gainsay or appeal.

The import which Irving places upon "horsemanship" can be greater clarified by Brom himself:  "Brom" is a nickname for "Abraham," which is Hebrew for "father of a multitude."  If one knows the stories of the Bible, then one already knows which of the two men will receive the hand of the "fair Katrina," for the name "Katrina" means "Pure and pure of heart."  For not only is Brom a "champion" upon horseback, but his horses's name is Daredevil, which leads many to assume in reading The Legend of Sleepy Hollow that Brom is the Headless Horseman; however, I would suggest, that because Brom is the only one who can handle Daredevil, it shows that Brom has mastered the devil, unlike Ichabod who is fascinated by the devil; like St. George slaying the dragon, Brom can discipline his heart and his mind, whereas Ichabod "gives way to flights of his imagination."  It is because of this self-discipline that Brom holds the right--in the eyes of the citizens--to discipline others:  the last sentence in the quote above demonstrates that, like the Prophets of the Old Testament, Brom is also a judge.
But there is a judge to whom Ichabod is compared:  the Reverend Cotton Mather.  Mather will be forever linked to the most infamous Salem Witch Trials for which his writings aided the judges of those accused of witchery.

Title page of Wonders of the Invisible World (1693)
by Cotton Mather. Irving writes that Ichabod,
"was a perfect master of Cotton Mather's History
of New England Witchcraft, in which, by
the way, he most firmly and potently believed."

Irving likens the struggle between Ichabod and Brom to a battle and a war, and this is very literal because the two men represent opposing forces trying to become the dominant force shaping and defining America (the wealth of the van Tassel farm which Irving symbolizes the wealth of America and the question is, "Which of the two sides shall inherit the kingdom").  At the end of the van Tassel party, Irving writes that Ichabod had effectually lost the hand of Katrina, but Ichabod didn't know why he was rejected:  it's because "the pure in heart shall see God," and in Ichabod, Katrina knew that there was nothing "Godly" about him, so she rejects his suit.

The Courtship in Sleepy Hollow, 1868.

During this time frame when Irving was writing, the writer was often considered to be an observer, and writing was almost always in a narrative form with very little to no dialogue and Irving follows this convention in The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.  There is, however, one line of dialogue and one line only that comes at a precise moment necessary for understanding the entire story.  As Ichabod journeys homewards after Katrina rejects him, Ichabod finally sees himself as he is, but he is such a monster he doesn't recognize himelf:

The hair of the affrighted pedagogue rose upon his head with terror. What was to be done? To turn and fly was now too late; and besides, what chance was there of escaping ghost or goblin, if such it was, which could ride upon the wings of the wind? Summoning up, therefore, a show of courage, he demanded in stammering accents, "Who are you?" He received no reply. He repeated his demand in a still more agitated voice. Still there was no answer. Once more he cudgelled the sides of the inflexible Gunpowder, and, shutting his eyes, broke forth with involuntary fervor into a psalm tune. Just then the shadowy object of alarm put itself in motion, and with a scramble and a bound stood at once in the middle of the road. Though the night was dark and dismal, yet the form of the unknown might now in some degree be ascertained. He appeared to be a horseman of large dimensions, and mounted on a black horse of powerful frame.  (Emphasis added)

Ichabod is the Headless Horseman because Ichabod has "lost his head" to superstition.  Irving writes that Ichabod

was, in fact, an odd mixture of small shrewdness and simple credulity. His appetite for the marvellous, and his powers of digesting it, were equally extraordinary; and both had been increased by his residence in this spell-bound region. No tale was too gross or monstrous for his capacious swallow. It was often his delight, after his school was dismissed in the afternoon, to stretch himself on the rich bed of clover bordering the little brook that whimpered by his schoolhouse, and there con over old Mather's direful tales, until the gathering dusk of evening made the printed page a mere mist before his eyes. 


And elsewhere Irving tells us that


Another of his sources of fearful pleasure was to pass long winter evenings with the old Dutch wives, as they sat spinning by the fire, with a row of apples roasting and spluttering along the hearth, and listen to their marvellous tales of ghosts and goblins, and haunted fields, and haunted brooks, and haunted bridges, and haunted houses, and particularly of the headless horseman, or Galloping Hessian of the Hollow, as they sometimes called him. He would delight them equally by his anecdotes of witchcraft, and of the direful omens and portentous sights and sounds in the air, which prevailed in the earlier times of Connecticut; and would frighten them woefully with speculations upon comets and shooting stars . . . 

The "row of apples" mentioned suggests "a forbidden fruit" because by listening to superstitions, Ichabod becomes superstitious.  Superstition is a sin against the First Commandment, "To love God above all other things," because by loving God above all other things, we become like God; whenever we love something that is not God, we become like that thing we love; because Ichabod fills himself with the tales of the superstitious, he has become a goblin, a ghost, a monster, a Headless Horseman himself.

Irving wrote The Legend of Sleepy Hollow under the name
of Diedrich Knickerbocker, so if you don't believe that the
Headless Horseman is a "double" for understanding Ichabod Crane,
consider that Washington Irving has his own double pictured in this sketch above.

It's not that Brom Bones dresses as the Headless Horseman, or that Ichabod just imagines the Headless Horseman:  in art, the characters can see themselves in a way that we do not see ourselves in reality, but because of art, we can see ourselves in the characters.  Consider Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, in which Ebenezer Scrooge is allowed to see what will happen if he doesn't reform; this is the same premise for The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Ichabod seeing "his soul" in the Headless Horseman as if he were Dorian Gray looking at the portrait that had taken on all the sins he had committed.   

Ichabod Crane, Respectfully Dedicated to Washington Irving.
by William J. Wilgus, artist chromolithograph, c. 1856

Now that we know the Headless Horseman is Ichabod Crane,... Who is Ichabod Crane?  The guilt complex of Americans from the Salem Witch Trials.
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow was a great success at the time it came out because it allowed Americans to understand what had happened during the Trials and allow us to separate genuine religion from superstition:  while there is still the haunting of the memory of the Trials (like the haunting ghost of Ichabod himself), never fear, it won't happen again as long as we, like Ichabod, don't let our heads "get carried away."  It is clear that by associating the hero, Brom Bones, with Abraham and the judges of the Old Testament, that Irving is not in the least against religion, but all should be against superstition, and no where did superstition show itself plainer than in the Salem Witch Trials.

Examination of a Witch from 1853 illustrates the Salem Witch Trial. 

Obviously the Communist "witch hunts" of McCarthyism have been compared to Salem and could act as our modern day superstition, but that would be a dangerous platform for Christians:  secularists still use, unconsciously, the Salem persecutions as a means of justifying the separation of Church and State.  When the church takes over, look at what happens.  The Salem Witch Trials were orchestrated by elders of the Church but the hunt for Communists was orchestrated by the State, and that's why it has to be kept separate (remember, Joseph McCarthy was a Senator).  It is wiser to enumerate the qualities of human nature, rather than to create a clown out of Jesus Christ, but this is exactly what politicians do when they want to keep religion out of state affairs.

A 1947 propaganda comic book published by the
Catechetical Guild Educational Society raising
the specter of a Communist takeover.

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow still holds salient reminders of the importance of being religious (like Brom) and not superstitious (like Ichabod).  But politicians today see any call for "religious responsibility" or "moral accountability" as a sign of fanaticism and an invitation to the Ichabod Cranes of the world . . .  knowing this, Christians can articulate what happened and why religion is necessary to every person:  so when a Brom Bones comes along that will be the "father of a multitude," we won't mistake him for the Headless Horseman. 

Australian Apocalypse: Men At Work

From 1981, the Australian group, "Men At Work" perform their rock chart hit Down Under; we are only going to consider the song/lyrics in this post as the video is its own separate entity:

This video and Who Can It Be Now? (included at the very end) are both good examples of non-Christian sources (a punk rock band) pointing to "signs of the time" and making subtle suggestions that there would be a price to be paid for the rampant immoral behavior taking place in 1980-81; by close examination of the lyrics and how the lyrics work together to create a message, we can understand what was going on beneath the seemingly jovial and carefree lifestyle.

A Volkswagen Kombi, symbolic of the Hippie era, free love and drugs.

The first line in the lyrics, “Traveling in a fried out kombie, on a hippie trail” hails the quintessential hippie symbol of the Volkswagen van which in turn symbolically refers to the will, because our will is the vehicle by which we make decisions that transports us through life. And, if it’s “fried out,” that means it has been maximized and there isn't anything left and they fully recognize this lifestyle—like hippies in general—just can’t last. 

The "trail" of the hippies means, quite literally, they have been living the life hippies advocated:  sex, drugs and music.  The second line of the lyrics, “Head full of zombie” is the key to understanding this song: it’s a drug cocktail meant to give a sense of "euphoria" or well-being. 

A fictional depiction of the very real "Stolen Generation" also depicted in the film
Rabbit-Proof Fence: Aboriginal children were stolen from their biological parents
and re-introduced into white society so they would forget their Native heritage.

“I met a strange lady, she made me nervous,” refers to an Aboriginal woman, and the reason she makes him nervous is because of his shame at the way native Australians were enslaved, yet he is a slave to drugs. This “strange lady” who offers him breakfast, is giving the drug addict “food for thought” and literally “breaking the fast”: he’s been fasting from food (to binge on drugs) and now he’s in between highs and is capable of taking a different path.

The Jupiter de Smyrne, holding a
thunderbolt or lightning bolt in his right
hand, the traditional symbol associated
with Zeus discovered in Smyrnain 1680.

The refrain of “running and taking cover” from the thunder that is about to sound, invokes the most ancient of gods, Zeus and his traditional symbol of power and wrath, the bolt of thunder or lightning which was always a sign that he was about to wreck revenge for wrong-doings. 

The largest gaol in Australia that was used in the importing of convicts.

When anyone asks, “Do you come from the land down under?” it’s rhetorical (does anyone need to ask Peter Lik if he’s from Australia?). It’s a statement, specifically pertaining to the stigma of “criminal history.”  By invoking this criminal history in the present, he's suggesting that there are still criminal activities taking place today, and they will be judged accordingly. 

The gold mine known locally as the"Super Pit."

“Where woman glow and men plunder,” refers to the great gold mine of Australia, that men have plundered and given to the women to wear, and this greed is the reason why, “Can’t you hear, can’t you hear the thunder? You better run, you better take cover…” the emphasis repeated on “can’t you hear?” means anyone with any sense should know that there is a price to be paid when people behave like this, and "this" is ambiguous because it's meant to agitate the conscious so that people will reflect on their own behavior and question what it is they might be doing and what they should be doing instead. 

Police in Detroit inspecting equipment used in the illegal production of alcohol
during Prohibition which was then sold in Speakeasies. Patrons of the bars had to
"speak easy" either to enter (using a password) or when ordering alcohol.

“Buying bread from a man in Brussels/He was six foot four and full of muscle/I said, ‘Do you speak my language” suggests that he heeded the warning to take food instead of drugs, however, it’s more likely that he thought this man was a drug dealer:  “do you speak my language?” doesn’t refer to a dialect of English, rather, like the American speakeasies during Prohibition, it’s supposed to be a sign that he wants to buy drugs, but the singer has made a mistake, the man really is selling bread and it's not a front for drugs.

The Vegemite spread on toast.

“He was 6’4 and full of muscle,” represents health, and I would like to venture, even a missionary: he’s selling bread, “the bread of life,” and offers the singer a “vegemite sandwich.”  Vegemite is made from a yeast substance, so there is yeast on top of the yeast (from the yeast in the bread) and this invokes the Scripture to toss out the old yeast and replace it with the new. Like the strange lady he first met, this man full of muscle is offering him food for thought and a new path in life.

Next, the 6’4 man says that he himself comes from “the land down under, where the beer does flow and men chunder” and it’s interesting that he would say this because it demonstrates that he had been an alcoholic (“chunder” is slang for “vomit” which is a good sign here because it symbolizes the “rejection” of the alcohol).  The man full of muscle is encouraging the singer to repent and give up the drugs as he himself had given up alcohol… but the advice seems to fall upon deaf ears.

A man with two women smoking opium in a den in the 19th century.

Next, the singer is “lying in a den in Bombay…” now, there’s only one type of den in Bombay, and that’s an opium den: “slack jaw, and not much to say,” validates that he’s “eating opium” like the zombie cocktail earlier in the song and that he is still failing to heed everyone's advice.

In making the connection between being “tempted” and coming from “the land of plenty,” it becomes apparent that Australia is a land rich in narcotics:  it has some of the highest housing prices in the world and a very stable economy, and with that comes the need for... what? Escape? Euphoria? Or something that will--at least temporarily--fill the emptiness that existence brings when the "yeast" is not building up.
Land Down Under, then, is a warning from the band to the world in general, that unless we repent and take a different path (unlike the singer in the song) we’re going to pay the price.  The song was released in 1981 and many films (which I will discuss in a forthcoming blog) were making the same kind of prophetic statements about "impending doom" which Men At Work seem to be proposing in this song.  I don't think they were being fanatics. 

In 1981 AIDS broke out. 

I would like to cross-reference their other hit, “Who Can It Be Now?” which invokes the Gospel passage, “Whosoever hears me knocking and answer, I will come and recline at table with him”:  while they know that someone is knocking, they don't know Who and they don't know Why, hence, the door cannot be opened.   It's not so much that "Men At Work" are Waiting For Godot, but that Godot, is waiting for them. 

So, what are these “Men At Work” working at? Self-perpetuating doom.  

American Gothic, American Theology: Grant Wood

Grant Wood, American Gothic, 1930,
Art Institute of Chicago.

It is one of the most recognized and parodied paintings in the world:  American Gothic by Grant Wood.  While we are used to seeing the man and his wife on their farm, the strangeness of the title remains:  what does American Gothic mean?

Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

"Gothic" describes a style of architecture from the High Middle Ages of which the Notre Dame cathedral of Paris is the most famous.  It is a monument to Theology and the spiritual progression of the soul:  when you are inside the church, the main level is dark, but when you look up, light fills the upper portion of the church because of the stained glass windows above; spiritually, the "darkness" symbolizes our life on earth, and as we pray and progress spiritually, we are "lifted up above ourselves" to where the windows are (representing reflection that comes from prayer) which allows the Light of God's Grace into our lives and we achieve understanding and wisdom, our darkness is illuminated and we advance spiritually, receiving a small taste of the Joy that awaits us in Heaven.  The great size of the cathedral reminds us that our main purpose in life is to serve God and attain Heaven.

The clerestory windows of Catedral del Buen Pastor de San Sebastián.

Most art historians believe that the "Gothic" in American Gothic refers to the Gothic Revival style of the house behind the man and woman; compared to the grandiose style of Notre Dame, it seems rather anti-climatic so how does Grant Wood tie in the High Middle Ages with Midwest American farmers?

You may click on any of the images for closer examination.

The man represents "the founding fathers":  his dark coat and the white shirt with the "Roman"-styled collar of a preacher (which is echoed by the woman's Pilgrim white collar and black dress) invokes the Pilgrims and Puritans who sought religious freedom.  Additionally, his eyes are enlarged by the frames of his glasses which is a standard device in religious art for conveying wisdom.  Wood incorporates these references to remind the viewer that originally the privilege of being an American was freedom of worship, not economic prosperity.

Since the earliest days of Christian iconography, enlarged
eyes have symbolized wisdom because the wise are able
to see deeper and further than the foolish. Bust sculpture of
Constantine the Great in marble at the Capitoline Museum. 

With his pitchfork in hand, he invokes the Protestant work ethic as the grandiose structure upon which American life is based:  the Protestant work ethic is rooted in "the Calvinist emphasis on the necessity for hard work as a component of a person's calling and worldly success and as a visible sign or result (not a cause) of personal salvation" (Wikipedia, "Protestant Work Ethic").  This "emphasis" on hard work, Wood seems to be telling us, has now become an end unto itself for Americans and Wood does this in two ways.
First, the pitchfork the man holds:  of all the instruments and tools that Wood could have chosen, he chose a pitchfork (and he didn't have to chose a tool at all, Wood could have had the man just standing there, or with his arm around his wife).  But the pitchfork is important because it suggests that he has "pitched" something:  God.

One of the famous parodies of Wood's work by Gordon Parks
who called this American Gothic. Parks demonstrates, in the
woman holding the broom, mop in background against a flag, that
Washington and the country "need to be cleaned up."  This parody
emphasizes the importance of Wood having employed the "pitchfork"
in his painting and how a simple "prop" can communicate.

Wood seems to be suggesting that, in America and the land of the free, we have freed ourselves of religion and made a theology of work.  The hints of the man's outfit that associate him with the Pilgrims, has been incorporated into his daily work routine to justify his work, not to be justified before God.

Farmers using pitchforks to move hay.

The second way Wood communicates that work has become the primary focus of Americans is by the very distant church in the background.  If you look over the tree on the left side of the canvas, just to the side of the woman's head, sticking up far in the background is a small "whisp" above the trees that is a steeple of a church and in this way, the church--and all it represents--is literally "in the background."  Whereas in the medieval ages, the church could be seen for miles and was the center of the community, in Wood's American Gothic, the home is the center of the painting because it is the center of American life.

The house is centered in the painting and shares the
space only with the barn. The barn invokes Christ's parable
about the man who accumulated wealth and was going to
build another barn to hold all his grain, but didn't know
that his life would be demanded of him that very night.
Note also how, at the very pinnacle of the house, there
is a weather vane but Wood chooses not to show
"which way the wind is blowing."

The home replaces church, work replaces God.

The farm has become the place of worship and work has become the new religion.
None of this seems revolutionary today, but remember, this was done in 1930.
If you look above the woman's right shoulder (click on the image and a larger image will open in a new window), a thin strand of her hair hangs out of her tightly wound bun.  If she represents America, then America is "coming undone."  A woman's apron is her work clothes the way overalls are a man's work clothes.  Her brown apron suggests her humility in work but that it's adorned with the pattern and the fringe implies vanity and taking "pride in her humility"; further, the apron covers her Pilgrim style dress, and this is very literal:  if the apron represents work and the dress symbolizes the religious freedom the Pilgrims were seeking, then work is covering up religion.  If America, in the Roaring 20's, made an idol out of work, then work will be taken away:  in 1929, unemployment in America was only around 3%; by 1933, it had jumped to 25%.
The sour, or bitter, or disappointed or tragic expression on her face--it's difficult to decide what it is--is partially hidden because--unlike the solid gaze of her husband who "views the viewer as the viewer is viewing him," her face is turned, looking off into the distance, perhaps searching for the sign of hope that things are about to improve.  But she's not making any move towards the church in the background.

Icon of Saint Mary of Egypt doing the "holy works" of God.

Grant Wood's American Gothic then, has become an iconic painting because, like the medieval Icons, this painting depicts two American saints, a husband and his wife, with the sign of the pitchfork, before their place of worship, the hearth and the barn, and communicates a religious truth about Americans:  salvation is achieved through work and to work hard is to be a virtuous American.  It's not that the Protestant work ethic is bad, but when applied by humans stained by Original Sin, it's obvious that we've turned enslavement into salvation.

Van Gogh: the Spiritual Struggle of Irises

Irises, by Vincent van Gogh, painted 1889, a year before his death.

Vincent van Gogh is one of the most famous artists who has ever lived and this painting Irises is widely reproduced.  It's very easy to see the lone white iris as the "one who stands out from the crowd," and this is perhaps autobiographical for van Gogh, that he felt himself standing out from others, but, van Gogh specifically called this Irises, not wildflowers or garden with purple and white, or some other title.   Therefore, thereby and therewith, "irises" must be a clue.
Some notes about the character of irises...

The "harsh" conditions under which iris flowers
thrive reminds us of the Way of the Cross,
and how the difficulties, pain and suffering
of the Cross brings out the flowers
of virtue and the fruits of the Holy Spirit.

The rougher the conditions are, the better irises grow; it's best to leave their roots exposed, don't give them much water or attention.  It's rather common that if planting all blue irises, a white one, or two, will also come up.  And last but not least:  irises are practically impossible to kill.
With this in mind, let us imagine a soul that God is looking upon and shaping, as the potter with his clay.
Blue is the color of wisdom and green the color of hope, white is the color of faith and purity, brown is the color of humility.

An iris known as "the blood iris."  As the iris opens up its petals,
it symbolizes Christ stretching out His arms upon the Cross
and how we are to open our hearts to Him.

Throughout the Bible, there is a plethora of images of the soul has a garden, and God as the gardener (think of the very first garden, Eden).  Van Gogh had spent the first part of his life as a preacher, so he was very familiar with the Bible and with those important images that are used by the faithful even today for spiritual development.  For van Gogh, the Irises are a painting of his soul.
Wisdom (the blue irises) grows upon the stems of hope (the stalks of the irises) and when there is great wisdom, there is also faith (the white iris that has sprung up).  But it is all planted within the ground of humility, and it is because the soul must suffer the Way of the Cross (as irises grow better when they suffer), so, too does the soul God longs to perfect.

Notice how the irises seem to be "blown over" on the left side of the canvas:
it symbolizes the Holy Spirit "breathing" upon us and how it seems that, when
we are bowed down by the weight of our crosses, we are also feeling the Presence
of the Holy Spirit.  The irises on the right side of the canvas are nearly
"writhing," showing that they are growing.

There is a final note to be added:  the background.  The orange and yellow flowers are usually cropped out of the popular reproductions of this painting, but their vibrant color and the great number of them suggests that there is the crowd that van Gogh is standing out from, but not necessarily wanting to.  The yellow and orange signifies life, and vibrancy, all the things that van Gogh's life wasn't.  It seems like he's divided the garden into two:  his soul, and the souls of the "worldly."  He longs, at times at least, to have that "easy" kind of life, but he has painted his Irises to remind himself--so close to his death--that in following God, he has chosen "the better part."

Corn Fields and Greed: John Steuart Curry

John Steuart Curry, Kansas Corn Field,
1933, Wichita Art Museum.

It has been described as a picture of the heartland, something quaint and invoking of the picturesque; it's none of that, and all one has to do is look at the year to know that this is a scathing critique of big industry propelled by greed.
When Europeans were moving west and settling this great country, they were hungary for land, land they could own and make their own; that was the reason for leaving the "motherland" because it belonged to the rich and it would always belong to the rich.  But as they were settling America, they bypassed that strip of the country from North Dakota down through the Texas panhandle.  Today it is called the Great Plains, but then it was called the American Desert, and the wagon trains just rolled right on past it. When there was no more "good" free land left, then the late-comers started settling in the "American Desert" and changing the landscape.  In 1929, Wall Street collapsed and in 1930 the drought started in the Plains.

Abandoned farm house in Texas during the Great Depression.

Curry painted Kansas Corn Field in 1933, when there had already been 3 years of no rain and severe drought was gripping the country's mid-section.  It wasn't until November of 1933 that the first of the dust storms started, but a Dust Bowl wasn't needed by American artists like John Curry and Grant Wood, they knew what was happening.  "Power farming" had been ripping up the native grasslands of the Plains and replacing it with crops demanding lots of water; coupled with over grazing by various herd animals, the result was catastrophe.
What Curry is showing us in Corn Fields is not what one would call the quaint, rather, a tragedy, and it simply can't be looked at any other way:  the ripe, yellow and green stalks of healthy corn would probably never be on the Plains again, and it was because of man forcing nature to do what it couldn't do, all for the sake of profit.  When we look at photos below, it doesn't even seem like it can be real, the land is so desolate, but Curry offers the other side of this photo:  what the land once was and may never be again.

The Weather Channel recently named the Dust Bowl as the number one
greatest weather disaster to have ever hit the United States.

There is also another side to this "simple" painting:  the American Dream itself.

If you look at it again, and say, but it does seem picturesque, that's probably because it's a picture we have in our mind but not from nature.  Perhaps we are asking too much of the American Dream, if we want those giant stalks of corn, those blue skies and beautiful white clouds where "rain follows the plough," (to quote an old saying of real estate agents trying to sell unfarmable land).
But the stalks also represent the souls who dream the dream, Americans themselves:  they have matured but they haven't started to grow into the cob.  The up front and center-most stalk has it's sheath flying over the "head" of the stalk, and it's suggesting the winds of change sweeping over the American people as the years of the Great Depression kept going and weren't ending. The American has always been, and will always be, the greatest resource of this country; and our own, individual greatest resources are our dreams, but they don't grow in the eroded soil of greed.

Lady Agnew & Muddy Alligators: John Singer Sargent & World War I

John Singer Sargent's Lady Agnew of
Lochnaw, 1893, in the National Gallery of Scotland.

John Singer Sargent has been described as a "relic of the Gilded Age" of American politics and never really given any consideration as a serious painter; why not? Because they are so beautiful and technically accomplished.  One of his most famous portrait paintings, Lady Agnew of Lochnaw from 1893 clearly supports this suggestion:  the beautiful woman exhibits her power by her very straight, forward and unflinching gaze; her white gown pulled over the muscle of her crossed, left leg is a symbol of her will power (and it's "crossed," I might add, meaning she is holding herself back by her will power) while the great "patch" of nearly pure white fabric covering the left knee communicates faith.  The wall coloring is perfectly balanced, hinting at green but perhaps closer to blue, and this creates a cloud of ambiguity around her.

Click on the image and it will expand for better viewing. When we are at an art museum, unless we be trained art historians or artists, we are most likely to be drawn to the portraits; why? We feel like the portraits are the "safe art," the art that is easiest to engage with and understand; rarely is that the case because of the human drama contained within each singular portrait. The job of the portrait painter is to capture the essence of the person's being in paint; not an easy task. The analysis of the portrait then, requires a balanced application of art knowledge, technique and human psychology. For example, the gaze of Lady Agnew is straight at the viewer; we are being viewed by her, just as we are viewing her in the portrait. That's a sign of her personal presence and power, an equality with the viewer regardless of their class or sex (for 1893, this would have been rather scandalous: women were more meek and docile, especially in public, but not Lady Agnew who obviously knows how to hold her own with anyone). What is the source of her concentrated intensity? Because hair (or anything worn on the head) symbolizes our thoughts (since hair is closest to our head, and the head is the place where our thoughts originate) that her hair is pulled back suggests she is mentally disciplined and doesn't reveal what she is thinking to just anyone; on the contrary, if her hair were down, it would indicate that she was not a mentally disciplined person, rather, she let everyone know what she was thinking at all times (or she was at least quite easy to read). There is a subtle arch in her right eyebrow, as if she is skeptical of what she sees (and what she sees is us, the viewers) and that, too, gives her a sense of power, that she's analyzing us just as we analyze her. Women of child-bearing age symbol the "motherland," the land which gave birth to us (women who are beyond child-bearing age symbolize the traditions and culture of the land, while girls not quite to puberty symbolize the future of the motherland); because this is in Scotland, we can easily take Lady Agnew to be Sargent's commentary on the Scottish motherland, and the best emblem of that is around her neck. Just over her heart is the enormous jewel. We know that the neck symbolizes what leads us and guides us in life, like a leash around us, so this pendant reveals to the viewers that, just as Lady Agnew has married for wealth rather than love (the pendant is over her heart) so Scotland entered the United Kingdom, not for love of unity, but for the wealth it would bring the Scottish people (whether or not the Scottish have sufficiently benefited from union is up for debate). 

But this is the most important element of the painting:  her comfortable, beautiful chair is pushed into a corner.  If we play a political game for a moment, Lady Agnew transforms from a socialite beauty into a symbol of Scotland itself.

The Stone of Scone in the Coronation Chair at Westminster Abbey, 1855.

When one is "pushed into a corner," it's not a very comfortable position to be in; so it appears that she has been given this comfortable chair to make it easier.  It's not the Stone of Scone, the traditional throne upon which Scottish kings were crowned which was removed to Westminster Abbey by the English; Lady Agnew's chair is a symbol of the material wealth accumulated as a result of union, the union between Lord and Lady Agnew, or of England and Scotland.

What about her dress? It's not nearly as fanciful as many portraits of wealthy patrons, but it is quite feminine, even as we enter into how powerful her presence is. Arms symbolize strength, we use our arms on a daily basis to lift and  carry; the sleeves of her gown are transparent, showing her arms, indicating that Sargent found her to be a strong woman, but those arms are in repose, they aren't using their strength. On the left arm, as it casually hangs down, we see a gold bracelet, suggesting a shackle; since that arm isn't prominently placed to display the jewelry, Sargent provides his commentary on Lady Agnew's marriage and the way this intense woman has been,... domesticated. What about the lavender sash around her impossibly tiny waist? Lavender is derived from purple, purple being both the color of kings and of royalty, because the king is supposed to suffer for his people, not the people suffer for their king. In this instance, the sash seems to be acting more as a chastity belt, suggesting this woman doesn't have a very fulfilling marriage to Lord Agnew, who possibly couldn't be everything his bride needed (this is rather prophetic of Sargent since the marriage produced no children and it was Lord Agnew's nephew who took over the position).. The lavender bows on his arms--again, a symbol of her strength--suggests that she has to hold herself in check with Lord Agnew who possibly didn't like her showing her own strength or, Lady Agnew had to hold herself in check with other members of her own high society, her boldness not being appreciated in the gentler classes. 

Lady Agnew is beautiful and wealthy, pampered and safe, but also, a prisoner:  her golden bracelet on her left wrist indicates that she's bound; a prisoner may be bound in chains of gold, but is still a prisoner nonetheless.  Now the ambiguous coloring of the wall behind her suggests that she is being lured by either hopes of future independence (if the color is green) or lulled to sleep (if it's closer to blue) by her comfortable position in the corner. Perhaps you think this is all a bit much: Sargent was "just a portrait painter," after all, and investments of these kinds of political theories are just the bored suppositions of an art historian trying to make a name for herself; let's go to some bigger political games to see if we can find something comparable elsewhere, shall we?

Muddy Alligators, watercolor over graphite on paper, 1917.

There are two hints pertaining to what this watercolor of Floridian reptiles is saying:  there are six alligators and the year is 1917.  World War I was dragging on in muddy trench warfare (like the bodies of the alligators) and America was "finally getting in."  The six gators represent the six European Superpowers of the day:  Prussia, Russia, Austria-Hungary, England, France and Italy.  If you look at the bottom of the painting, the water line comes into the space of the viewer, or, the viewer is coming into the space of the waterline, the front line.  For the viewer--especially the American viewer--it is literally "crossing the pond" (the Atlantic Ocean) to enter the War, the pit of the enormous alligators fighting over their mud.

For the years of World War I, soldiers lived in mud, fought in mud and died in mud. The trenches were elaborate mazes under ground, cold, wet and always depressing.

Here is the important point:  "muddy."  Muddy refers to the new tactic that was being used in World War I:  trench warfare.  The mud would accumulate in the trenches and become the biggest enemy that soldiers had to fight because it was a perfect medium for disease. In his "Muddy Alligators," Sargent employed pencil on paper, then painted in with watercolors, and it's an uncanny statement of how events unfolded:  treaties were signed between all the powers (the graphite on paper) and then the blood and carnage of the warring states filled in the empty places of what all those treaties actually meant, blood and carnage (the watercolors "bleeding" into each other as they dripped).  This was Sargent's statement on war:  like the reptiles from an ancient, uncivilized era, man's primordial hunger for power and (unlawful) gains through war would cost everyone more than they could have ever foreseen, and now, we--the viewers and America--have been dragged into it. This isn't meant to be a definite statement on either of Sargent's works, however, I hope they offer reason to take the "grand manner" portrait painter a bit more seriously, as well as any portrait you might encounter at the museum. 

That's Not Art! Craftsmanship and Quality in the Plastic Arts

Princesse Albert de Broglie, née Joséphine-Eléonore-Marie-Pauline de
Galard de Brassac de Béarn, 1853, by Ingres. Metropolitan Museum of Art.

These are the two words that modern art historians hate:  "craftsmanship" and "quality."  Most people feel that they can look at a painting and tell you if it is art by judging the standard of craftsmanship, such as in the above painting by the Frenchman Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres.
But is art only about rendering an accurate depiction of nature?
In the statement which I offer as a motto for this blog, I quote poet William Butler Yeats:  "Supreme art is a traditional statement of certain heroic and religious truth, passed on from age to age, modified by individual genius, but never abandoned."

No. 5, 1948, Jackson Pollack

Most people would agree that No. 5 from Abstract Expressionist painter Jackson Pollack is not art:  there is no heroic value, there is no religious truth and lastly, they would argue that there is neither craftsmanship nor quality ("I could do that," is what they would say, combining the last two arguments in that disgusted statement).
But how does one render the soul?
How do you show someone the accumulated agony of your life's burdens, your sorrow, your pain?
How does one show you a soul in a state of mortal sin?
This "pile of paint" represents us in our most agonized moments, our most undignified suffering, our greatest loneliness, our despair, because it is the layers and layers and layers of accumulated (pain)t that separates us from others, from our very self, from God.
How do you depict the worst day of your life, the day that never seems to end but endures year after year?  Isn't it comforting to know that you are not alone, someone else has been there, too.
Isn't No. 5, after all, a pretty good attempt at showing the misery, the darkest spot of my soul, the damage that has been committed upon that immortal fabric created in the image of God and now soiled, stained and decomposing?  Doesn't it show how even the bright spots--a thin ribbon of yellow here and there--even that entangled and entrapped by the blackness and decay of all the rest of... "it."
But does one have to abandon craftsmanship and quality to show something this deep, this intangible?
I would argue no:  there is a high level of craftsmanship in this painting and, actually, you probably couldn't paint this.  BBC presenter and historian Dan Snow continually raises the bar of historical research by always testing and enduring for himself the stories of history to prove or disprove accuracy in the written word.  If Dan were to put himself through the painting of a "Jackson Pollack," he would be exhausted:  it would take weeks, maybe even months, of back breaking, exhausting numbness.  He would be weighted down with the paint in one hand and the exhaustion of continual movement with the brush in the other hand.  He would go mentally numb and become an "automaton" without realizing--or even caring--what he was doing.  Not to mention his neck, shoulders and legs aching, from the hours and hours of standing and moving, to and fro...

Photograph of Jackson Pollack "action painting." 

But does that mean that Ingres has failed to reproduce anything in the soul of the Princess (pictured above)?  One could say that her left hand, extended and yet limp, sums up her character:  because the arm is always a symbol of someone's strength, that it's so limp, surely signifies to the viewer that she herself is of weak nature.  The light falling upon the back of the gown may denote a woman who is naturally very "bright" whereas the darker shadows on the front of the gown suggest that all the "entrapments" of royalty have created someone who appears grumpy or disagreeable to others who do not know her.  In all the sittings which would have been required for this portrait, Ingres would have gotten to know the Princess at least somewhat:  the way she treated servants, messengers, himself.  This would come across--even, or especially--unconsciously in the artist's rendering of her.
But does it show her soul? Does it show something heroic or some great religious truth?
Perhaps it does, perhaps it doesn't.
Look at the title again:  "Princesse Albert de Broglie, née Joséphine-Eléonore-Marie-Pauline de Galard de Brassac de Béarn"... isn't that pile of names similar to the pile of paint that Pollack shows us?  What kind of responsibility does she have? What kind of burdens smother her into submission of her status the way a beggar is suffocated by his poverty?  It is easy to look at the beauty of the golden chair, and see her sitting pretty without a care in the world, but hasn't Ingres managed to slip in a slight note of her cares and worries?  While a royal portrait must always be grand, hasn't he tried to show us a part of the very human who isn't allowed to be human, but bury herself and needs beneath layers and layers and layers of silk?  

This example is slightly larger:  do you notice how her rings seem to bound her rather than decorate her person? The chair seems to support her, like a crutch, instead of a prop. The lace around her arms appears to be hiding her, protecting her like a shawl, rather than adding to the beauty of the dress, the fashionableness of the wearer, wrapping her within herself, for there is nowhere else for her to go. 

Have you noticed all the little wrinkles and creases in that expensive silk dress?  Why do you think Ingres painted those in when it would have been easier to leave them out?  Are they contributing to our understanding of who she is in her deepest being?  Is it possible that her life isn't "smooth" but full of valleys and hills, creases and crevices, just like normal folk?
Are the strands of flawless pearls wrapped around her arm like chains, insisting that she herself be as flawless and beautiful as the pearls?
Does the portrait look a little different now then when you first saw it?
What happens so often in modern art is a break down of vocabulary, the bridge of communication between artist and viewer.  I had never been a big fan of Abstract Expressionism until I saw Simon Schama's The Power of Art (includes Caravaggio, Bernini, Rembrandt, David, Turner, Van Gogh, Picasso and Rothko; available on DVD and through Netflix).  When Schama communicated to me what Mark Rothko communicates to him, it became an entirely different situation, and I had to completely re-examine my relationship with the Abstract Expressionists, and I have.

No. 3/No. 13 (Magenta, Black, Green on Orange),
1949, 85 3/8" x 65", oil on canvas by Mark Rothko.

How different, really, is the "blank wall" behind the head of the Princess and the orange painted beneath Rothko's bars of magenta, black and green?  Are not the Coat of Arms of the Princess, painted in the upper right corner of the canvas, similar to the bars of color for Rothko? Are her coat of arms something "grafted" onto her being, that one notices as one notices the band of green against the orange?
In summary, do not immediately glance over a work like Ingres' princess portrait, and note only the fine craftsmanship, neither glance over abstract work like Pollack's and dismiss it as a fantastic hoax.  Engage art the way that you would want someone to engage with you; give it the benefit of a doubt that it's saying something and then strive to listen.
You'll be rewarded.