[2] Pyle, a painter himself and protégé of Wood, won blue ribbons at the Iowa State Fair for his art depicting the Midwest in 1933, and the grand prize in 1936.

[5] It depicts an awkward young man looking at the viewer as a butterfly lands on his shirt, set in a countryside while two men bathe in a nearby river.

[2] The art critic Luciano Cheles says that many of Wood's paintings—including his famous American Gothic—were inspired by works produced during the Italian Renaissance, especially those of the fifteenth-century artist Piero della Francesca.

[7] In both paintings, the central profile is "neatly" set apart from the background, looking at the viewer with a serious gaze; a figure with a distant look was a typical element of della Francesca's art.

[10] Details such as recurrent couplings (of trees, bushes, and stacks of hay) may demonstrate a love for Pyle, and the two nude swimmers in the back could represent the Christian figures Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

[11] The painting is thought to be homoerotic,[12] although critic Faye Hirsch says this interpretation allows researchers to make claims about Wood's life with only minimal evidence.

[17] For years, it was not shown publicly due to its significant deterioration: discoloration, extensive craquelure, and varnish disappearance plagued the painting.