Migrants to Iowa strike different portraits where ‘American Gothic’ was created
In Cedar Rapids, Grant Wood painted “American Gothic,” the iconic portrait of a man and a woman standing in front of a white frame house. Almost 100 years later, the residents of this Iowa river town strike many different profiles after more than a century of migration and faith-based resettlement efforts. On an August weekend, a grocery store owner attends Friday prayer alongside the descendants of Middle Eastern families who built the oldest surviving mosque in the U.S. Refugee families from Central and West Africa go to Methodist services and volunteer at a Catholic church’s sweet corn festival. And two churches belonging to the same Catholic parish celebrate Masses attended by the descendants of Czech migrants from the 19th century and new arrivals from Latin America.
