Representational and narrative art other than the religious is often devoted to local subjects: the family portrait, the individual farm or church, or a typical activity.
There are perhaps unconscious traces of the 30s work of Walker Evans and Dorothea Lange here, but Arnold's sombre and slightly surreal-looking group portrait of the farm owners, the Davis family, enjoying a picnic among the graves of their ancestors, is all her own.
A modest-size commissioned portrait of a heroic farm animal, it clearly demonstrates Hicks's highly developed naturalistic style.
The show also includes portraits of single farm workers and a group of works on paper that were mostly studies for the larger canvases.
She gives us an indelible portrait of Tassie's family farm, where her mother has set up mirrors behind the flowerbeds to multiply the foxgloves and nightshade and phlox, and where her father has her don a hawk costume and run in front of his thresher to scare wildlife from its hiding places.
It's a fascinating and heartening portrait of the state of sustainable farming in America today.
Charles Alston made evocative pictures of farm life and poverty in the South, like "Farm Boy," showing here, an affecting portrait done in 1941, during his fellowship.
Harrison keeps all of this from becoming overvaulting with the dear comedy of Laurette's portrait, Clive's physical self on the farm and finally a road trip with his estranged daughter.
At his victory scold in the State Dining Room on Thursday, the president who yearned to be transformational stood beneath an oil portrait of Abraham Lincoln and demanded... a farm bill.
"This book is both an intimate portrait of Nancy's life on the farm, and an important work that shows the universality of an authentic food culture".
