Norman Rockwell
September 20 - January 3, 2010
Object labels from the exhibition
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- THE FISHERMAN, 1916
- Oil on canvas; 24" x 16", signed lower left "N P Rockwell"
- Recreation cover, May 1916
- American Illustrators Gallery, NYC
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- Rockwell's three covers for Recreation magazine are somewhat
unusual because they appear in full color unlike the Country Gentleman,
Saturday Evening Post or Youth's Companion covers of the same
period. The covers, similar in style and content to Boy's Life magazine
illustrations, feature popular outdoor activities. This early cover painted
when Norman was just 22 years old, includes the date and his middle initial
"P" for Perceval, which Norman dropped the very next year. Rockwell's
signature style of his later covers is noticeably absent from this work,
but it does show his early interest in a painterly style.
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- FACT AND FICTION - OLD MAN AND YOUNG WOMAN READING
- 1917, oil on canvas
- 24 1/4" X 19 1/4", signed lower right
- Leslie's Magazine cover , January 11, 1917
- LNM# C90
- Inv 1177
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- A popular periodical, Leslie's Illustrated Weekly, published
the painting Fact and Fiction showing Rockwell's early style as
his illustration career was launched. While his early Saturday Evening
Post covers usually featured children, the six covers he painted for
Leslie's focused primarily on adult situations. This particular
image presents another Rockwell-created dichotomy the universal balance
between young and old. While these persons seemingly have no interest in
one another, chances are that they might have had interests as youths meeting
on the same train, given similar circumstances. The 'elder' is depicted
as worn-out, perhaps a doctor with a black leather bag, obviously reading
a 'used' newspaper. The 'younger' anxiously sits on the train holding her
novel to her chest, clearly forlorn and wistful. As scruffy and uncaring
as the 'elder' seems, the 'younger' fashionably presents her with considered
accoutrement -- elaborate make-up, furs, flowers and jewelry. As Rockwell's
career progressed, he illustrated fewer covers for other publications and
focused almost entirely on the Saturday Evening Post.
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- COUSIN REGINALD PLAYS PIRATES
- 1917, oil on canvas on board
- 30" x 30", signed lower right
- Country Gentleman , November 3, 1917 cover
- The Norman Rockwell Encyclopedia, fig. 1-14, p. 16
- LNM# C41
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- PETTICOATS AND PANTS - MAN WEARING KILT, WOMAN WEARING SUIT
- 1918, oil on canvas
- 26 1/4" x 22", signed lower right
- Judge Magazine cover , June 1, 1918
- LNM# C85
- Inv 870
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- RUNAWAY, THE - RUNAWAY BOY AND CLOWN
- 1922, oil on canvas
- 36" x 24", signed lower right
- Life magazine cover , June 1, 1922
- LNM# C119
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- The Runaway shows Rockwell's ongoing interest in using a palette
with broad, rich colors and thick impasto in the fashion of the Old Masters.
Compare this work to those with the limited palette employed in earlier
Post illustrations. A different, more painterly approach gave him the ability
to create with more detail with stronger shade and shadows, and a fully
completed background. The fatherly clown offers tender consolation to the
terrified boy, with tears on each cheek, albeit pictured with a smiling
clown's face. In spite of his fears, the boy believed in the circus as
a refuge from the real world, school, homework, and chores, yet he suddenly
longs for home. He had dreams of an idyllic haven with wild animals and
exotic travel, a life full of excitement and amusement, all but dispelled
by the unforeseen dangers and frightening challenges. A photographic portrait
of Rockwell's painting The Runaway was featured in a Devoe Artists'
Materials advertisement in 1923. It shows a Rembrandt reproduction hanging
in the background, perhaps stimulating and reinforcing Rockwell's classical
style and technique in this picture.
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- THREADING THE NEEDLE
- 1922, oil on canvas
- 25 1/2" x 20 1/2", signed lower right
- Saturday Evening Post , April 8, 1922 cover
- LNM #C235
- Inv 663
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- Threading the Needle is prototypical of Rockwell's early Saturday
Evening Post covers. For his covers he used a design system that focused
on a single, central item surrounded by an abstracted, simple white background.
The cover's job was to sell magazines and Rockwell intuitively realized
that meant to 'tell a whole story with a single image.' He characteristically
obscured parts of the well-known title font with the image, to make his
images appear to be three-dimensional. Early Post covers had the
magazine name above two thick, horizontal black lines with the publication
date and price in red between the lines. Only Rockwell could get away with
such a blatant act of putting the art work in a more important position
than the name of the magazine -- it was heretical. Rockwell's work and
the Post itself were ubiquitous and everyone recognized the Post
even with its name obliterated. The model for this cover, Dave Campion,
offered himself as a perfect Rockwell type with his lanky, lean physique.
In fact he was so popular that the artist used him over again for Post
covers and in advertisements.
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- TIME TO RETIRE: OLD MAN WITH SHOPPING BASKET
- 1925, oil on canvas
- 32" x 26 1/2", signed lower right
- Saturday Evening Post , February 7, 1925
- Fisk Tire Company, automobile tire advertisement,1925
- LNM# A310
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- During the early 1920's, the Fisk Tire Company published a series of
advertisements by Norman Rockwell which capitalized on the double meaning
of Fisk's "Time to Re-Tire" slogan. Rockwell enjoyed painting
this series saying it allowed him "the freedom to originate my own
ideas," which he said was "half the fun of painting." Old
Man With Shopping Basket demonstrates Rockwell's use of "outsider"
characters during the twenties, when he began to incorporate sheriffs,
hobos, and circus performers into his illustrations. Rockwell's portrayal
of this character remains sympathetic. He added a touching element of humanity
and humor as the man hides behind the Fisk sign to avoid being hit by snowballs.
In orchestrating this scene, Rockwell is still considerate of his client's
purpose. Rockwell also uses a 'Double Entendre' as he ingeniously incorporates
selling new tire treads.
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- YOUNG VALEDICTORIAN
- 1928, oil on canvas
- 30" x 26", signed lower right
- Inv 727
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- Young Valedictorian is a rare Norman Rockwell painting for it
is one of his few, unpublished works. There is neither irony nor humor
present; it is simple matter of fact coupled with a certain tenderness.
Although it is not known why it went unpublished, the painting remains
an important and revealing example of Rockwell's development during the
1920s. It, like The Runaway, looks as if it had been painted by
a European Old Master and not by an American illustrator. However, this
painting does not surprise those familiar with Rockwell's ambidextrous
technical abilities, his stylistic treatment of subjects, or the various
stages of his career. Others are astounded that the same artist could paint
such a rich painting while working simultaneously on others as diametrically
different as Threading the Needle (1922).
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- This work particularly demonstrates Rockwell's incredible facility
with a paintbrush. He could bring extraordinary talent in almost any style
or period of fine art to the canvas at will, depending upon client and
assignment.
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- NO CHRISTMAS PROBLEM NOW - SANTA WITH A PARKER PEN
- 1929, oil on canvas
- 28" x 23", signed lower right
- Saturday Evening Post, December 14, 1929
- LNM#A653
- Inv 1554
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- CHRISTMAS - KNIGHT LOOKING IN STAINED GLASS WINDOW
- 1930, oil on canvas
- 44 1/4" x 34 1/4", signed lower right
- Saturday Evening Post , December 6, 1930 cover
- LNM #C320
- Inv 185
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- The Medieval knight is painted with related compositional elements
which each reinforce this image's historical context. Some defining elements
are the stilted Gothic arched window, the Knight's armor, and the title
'Christmas' in a medieval-style font, Rockwell often drew from historical
sources for inspiration and certainly one of his greatest professional
strengths was a devotion to accuracy. A stilted arch is also seen in the
Choir Boy, where Rockwell draws from ecclesiastical architecture
to stage the image. In this picture, the white background serves to make
the 'watch night' (Knight) appear colder against the snuggly warmth and
cheer within. The comfortable holiday revelers are apparently readying
to feast while the lone guard is thrown asunder 'to do his job.' It is
almost heart wrenching to note the warm interior glow reflecting on the
knight's freezing face as he dutifully and longingly witnesses the holiday
spirit of others.
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- VOLUNTEER FIREMAN
- 1931, oil on canvas
- 41" x 31", signed lower right
- Saturday Evening Post cover , March 28, 1931
- Buechner, illus. 265 © Curtis Publishing Company
- LNM #C322
- Inv 693
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- The Volunteer Fireman was Rockwell's first and only attempt
to create a painting by using Dynamic Symmetry. This is an ancient Greek
and Roman method for designing art and architecture with a proportional
grid system derived from natural geometric relationships. Rockwell had
two idols, the early Post cover illustrator JC Leyendecker, whom
he called "The Master of the Magazine Cover," and the great illustrator
of romance and fantasy images, Maxfield Parrish, who used this design system
frequently. Rockwell understood the system and was impressed with the outcomes
achieved by Parrish. He tried it on this seminal work, but later declared
it "difficult and time-consuming." On the other hand, he used
many of Leyendecker's techniques and even subject matter for his cover
work.
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- This painting portrays an eager young volunteer whose adrenaline drive
is the pure excitement of fire. He runs in stark contrast to the veteran
whose experience leaves him determined to succeed in the face of danger,
wholly unfazed by the naive youth's heroic ambitions, nor the dog along
for the ride.
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- CONCERT ON THE STEPS OF A PLANTATION - STUDY
- 1934, oil on canvas, 39" x 24",
- Study for Coca-Cola advertisement and calendar, 1934
- Study for #A196
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- SPRING TONIC
- 1936, oil on canvas
- 37" x 29", signed lower right
- Saturday Evening Post, May 30, 1936 cover
- LNM# C355
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- Spring Tonic is one of Rockwell's few early Post covers where
he painted the entire background rather than his traditional white background.
In 1935, Rockwell was commissioned to illustrate The Adventures of Tom
Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn; he anxiously wanted this commission and
left almost immediately for Hannibal, Missouri in order to absorb local
ambience. He completed the artwork for deluxe book editions and they were
widely beloved thereafter for his popular and much lauded illustrations.
A World Book Encyclopedia article described Rockwell's images of
Mark Twain's folks as "the people who live in everybody's home town,
barefoot teenage boys in particular." Rockwell recreated his earlier
Mark Twain book illustration, albeit making slight changes, perhaps for
copyright reasons. The cover shows Aunt Polly giving Tom Sawyer his tonic,
whilst the befuddled cat looks at the young hero. The composition clearly
influenced his later painting Tender Years -- Treating a Cold, (1957)
where an elderly couple, the husband wrapped in a patch-work blanket is
seen in a nearly identical pose as that of the woman and child in Spring
Tonic.
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- WORLD OF CHARLES DICKENS, THE - STUDY
- 1937, charcoal on paper
- 29" x 20", signed lower right
- Reader's Digest: 1937 Christmas Gift Subscription Card
- LNM# A686
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- NORMAN ROCKWELL VISITS A RATION BOARD
- 1944, oil on board
- 13 1/2" x 23 1/2", signed lower right
- Saturday Evening Post , July 15, 1944
- 'Norman Rockwell Visits a Ration Board' pp. 22-23
- LNM#S607
- Inv 1664
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- Norman Rockwell was one of the many artists to partake in the effort
to document WWII. While short-lived, the Ration Board regulated and allocated
the purchases of foodstuffs such as flour and sugar, as well as gasoline
and other items of necessity. Only small amounts of these items in short
supply could be purchased in order to conserve resources, and to be fair
to all. The controls Government imposed were exercised through coupon books
and ration coins -- a new currency minted for this purpose. Rockwell placed
himself in the painting at far left with pipe in mouth, next in line after
the gentleman to his left, a neighbor from Arlington, Vermont. All other
figures are models from Manchester, Vermont, the nearest Ration Board to
his hometown.
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- This painting is an example of an interior Saturday Evening Post
illustration. Interior illustrations were meant to carry a reader through
a magazine article or book. They were created to enhance and augment the
text, as opposed to the cover illustrations which were meant to sell the
book or periodical by capturing a customer's attention with an eye-catching
image. The Post editors praised this painting as a scene from history,
that some day would be forgotten.
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- CHARWOMEN IN THEATER - STUDY
- 1946, oil paint over photographic base
- 14 1/2 x 11 in., Signed "Norman Rockwell" bottom
- right, inscribed "To Morgan Harding sincerely
- Norman Rockwell" on the mat
- Saturday Evening Post , April 6, 1946 cover
- C427
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- From Rockwell on Rockwell: "It just came to me. I think
I have always wanted to paint a charwoman or some similar type of worker
-- the poor little drudge who has to tidy up after more fortunate people
have had a good timeHaving decided on this charwomen subject and that the
theatre is a logical setting, I made my little idea sketch... I decided
to go to an actual theatre to obtain authentic information on such things
as seats and aisles... I went to the office of the Shubert Theatres in
New York... The Physical Properties Manager felt that the Majestic Theatre,
where Carousel was playing, was typical, so we decided on that. A minor
hitch came when I learned that just to turn on the lights would cost about
forty dollars... After considerable negotiation, a way was found to reduce
this force to one electrician and his assistant. With this adjusted, off
we went to the Majestic, where I sketched and measured while a photographer
took some pictures -- one never knows how much information he may need
when he gets to work far from his original source... Then back I hurried
to Arlington where two neighbors, Mrs. Harvey McKee and Mrs. Charles Crofut,
posed as the charwomen. I felt hesitant about asking them to represent
such humble characters, but they were very good sports about it."
- NR
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- APRIL FOOLS - GIRL WITH SHOPKEEPER
- 1948, oil on canvas
- 18" x 17", signed lower center right
- Saturday Evening Post cover , April 3, 1948
- Buechner, illus. 429 © Curtis Publishing Company
- LNM# C442
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- This cover was one of only three April Fool's covers Rockwell painted
for the Saturday Evening Post. In this image, a young girl has entered
an antique shop and is talking to the shopkeeper amid the various oddities.
The scene contains almost sixty jokes that Rockwell included for the viewer
to discover. Some you can spot at once, such as Rockwell's signature written
backwards and spelled incorrectly; while others are much more difficult
to find, such as the portrait of Abraham Lincoln in a Confederate uniform.
This cover remains one of the most popular from the Saturday Evening
Post because it exhibits Rockwell's wonderful sense of humor as well
as his masterful artistic talent and attention to detail.
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- BRIDGE GAME - THE BID
- 1948, oil on canvas
- 46 1/2" x 38 1/2", signed lower left
- Saturday Evening Post cover , May 15, 1948
- LNM#C443
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- The composition for The Bridge Game was particularly challenging
for it is a one-point perspective, aerial view. Each card player's hand
is simultaneously exposed for the benefit of bridge-playing aficionados/viewers.
Rockwell knew nothing about the game and required the help of a bridge
expert and a wooden plank in order to undertake this work. The long plank
was nailed to the balcony floor over his photographer's studio while the
card expert arranged the four card hands. The plank hung over a table posed
with four models holding the cards assembled by 'Red', Rockwell's locally
(Chicago) selected bridge expert. The artist then asked the photographer
to venture out to the plank's edge to take a bird's-eye shot 'straight
down' for his use in creating the cover image. The exposure of all card
players' hands at once, as if from a secret casino security room above
the players, was Rockwell's notion, albeit before such observation rooms
existed.
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- BREAKFAST TABLE POLITICAL ARGUMENT - STUDY
- 1948, oil on acetate on board
- 10 1/4" x 11", signed lower right and inscribed, "To
- Herb Herrick, Sincerely, Norman Rockwell"
- Saturday Evening Post, October 30, 1948 cover oil study
- Study for America, illus 134
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- The 1948 Presidential Election was to mark a turning point for the
Republican Party, as the Democratic Party seemed weak and unstable. This
painting reflects the battle of Thomas Dewey versus Harry Truman for President
of the United States. The husband, dressed in a suit for work, shouts fiercely
at his wife who pouts sullenly and stubbornly with folded arms, across
from him. The husband points sharply at a magazine cover showing his support
for Dewey, while his wife clearly supports Truman. Both are so involved
in the debate over their candidates that neither seems to pay any attention
to the upset child at their feet or the hungry dog in the corner. The studies
for Breakfast Table Political Argument are both witty and charming
in their depiction of a suburban American lifestyle. It is a classic example
of Rockwell's traditionally entertaining approach to the world around him,
however fierce the characters.
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- SHUFFLETON'S BARBERSHOP - STUDY
- 1950, oil on canvas
- 33" x 31", unsigned
- Saturday Evening Post, cover study , April 29, 1950
- LMN#C452
- Inv 1607
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- This study is the quintessential example of Norman Rockwell's devotion
and commitment to every aspect of creating a Saturday Evening Post
cover. This monochromatic study presented many challenges; the most difficult
was painting a nearly lit room as seen through a dark room. This work exhibits
his lifelong fascination with the Old Masters, in this case, Vermeer. The
artist worked steadily over a three-month period with gloomy weather, each
day cloudier than before. Rockwell began to consider his work a failure
until he finally found a way, during a break in the weather, to get the
sharp contrasts he wanted to capture in the painting. He ultimately succeeded
in getting exactly what he sought by creating a collage from his sketches
and photos. His final efforts paid off and he created one of his most notable
paintings. Depicting an after-hours moment, a few local men gather in an
adjoining room to the barbershop to play music and relax after a long day.
The main character in this painting is the barbershop itself, a living
entity of another kind, it heralds simple down home American music-making.
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- SOLITAIRE (MAN IN BED PLAYING SOLITAIRE)
- 1950, oil on canvas
- 27" X 25", signed lower left
- Saturday Evening Post cover , August 19, 1950
- LNM #C453
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- During the 1950's, the public continued to steadily turn to Post
covers as reflections of their American way of life. As the premier magazine
cover artist and visionary of our national identity, Norman Rockwell was
the perfect artist to depict prototypical American figures; to wit: the
traveling salesman. For this cover, Rockwell sought to dispel the myth
that all commercial travelers spent their nights with an icy brew and a
'hot' woman. Many readers wrote to the Post thanking them for his
touching and honest portrayal of a lonely salesman. Rockwell went on to
use the theme of the traveling salesman for a Brown & Bigelow four
seasons calendar. From that series, there is another classic Rockwell image
of the traveling salesman selling an 'icebox' (refrigerator) to an Eskimo
in the Alaskan Winter.
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- DAY IN THE LIFE OF A LITTLE GIRL, A - STUDY
- 1952, Charcoal on paper
- 22 _" x 21 _", signed and inscribed lower right
- Saturday Evening Post cover , August 30, 1952
- LNM C462
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- The charcoal study for Day in the Life of a Girl shows a very
expressive child going through her daily activities. Rockwell met his model,
Mary Whelan, at a basketball game in which his son, Tommy, was playing.
The artist later commented that she was "the best darn model I ever
had, sad one minute, happy the next, and she raised her eyebrows just the
right way" Mary Whelan became Norman Rockwell's favorite model, a
very important figure in his paintings due to her charismatic, ever-changing
face.
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- CHOIR BOY COMBING HAIR FOR EASTER
- 1954, oil on canvas
- 29" x 26 1/2", signed lower right and inscribed en verso
'P709'
- Saturday Evening Post , April 17, 1954
- Thomas S. Buechner, Norman Rockwell: Artist & Illustrator, New
York, 1970, illustrated no. 482
- Christopher Finch, Norman Rockwell: 332 Magazine
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- During the 1950s, when more than half of Rockwell's forty-one covers
featured children, he made numerous references to his own childhood in
his paintings, as illustrated in The Choirboy. Recalling his days
in the church choir, Rockwell wrote, "On Sundays in the choir room
...The sexton, poking his head around the door, would yell that it was
time for us to enter the church. Plastering down our cowlicks, pushing,
jostling, we'd form two lines. Then, suddenly, we'd grow quiet and, solemn-faced,
march into the church" (The Norman Rockwell Album, p. 140).
Rockwell's painted version of this memory features a choirboy in hurried
preparation for an Easter service. Rockwell uses a paneled archway to frame
the setting and through it we glimpse the proof of last-minute preparations
in the scattered clothing, sneakers, and abandoned roller skates. Such
"behind-the-scenes" treatment appears throughout Rockwell's Post
covers, a vantage point which allowed him to show the human side of his
protagonists with humor and compassion.
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- TENDER YEARS - TREATING A COLD
- 1957, oil and pencil
- 18" x 18", signed lower right
- Brown & Bigelow Four Seasons Calendar (Spring), 1957
- LNM# A149
- Inv 1172
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- TENDER YEARS - TREATING A COLD - STUDY
- 1957, pencil
- 15" x 15", signed lower right
- Brown & Bigelow Four Seasons Calendar (Spring), 1957
- LNM# A149 study
- Inv 1173
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- Rockwell created numerous calendar illustrations for Brown and Bigelow,
which usually followed characters through the changing seasons of a year.
Rockwell painted his "four seasons" theme for Brown &
Bigelow for sixteen years, from 1948 to 1964. This example from the
Tender Years series focuses on a long-married couple in their day-to-day
lives, taking care of each other in a way that only a lifetime together
can create.
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- BOY GRADUATE
- 1959 , oil on canvas
- 74 1/2" x 36", signed lower right
- Saturday Evening Post , June 6, 1959 cover
- LNM #C494
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- For this Post cover image, Norman Rockwell has perfectly captured
the expression of a youthful college graduate with unabashed optimism,
coupled with newfound bewilderment at the real world he faces. Rockwell
separately provided a background for the finished cover which comprised
of newspaper headlines screaming contemporary problems to be shouldered
by this young grad and his generation. The headlines ranged from Russia's
"Khrushchev Warns West of War Danger" to "UN Atom Study
Panel Sees Fall-Out Peril." "Inflation Number-One Problem,"
"State officials to Seek US Help for Job Woes" are all problems
similarly faced today for young graduates. Here Rockwell's son, Peter,
poses for this near life-size portrait as the boy graduate. The publication
added another contrast between its readers optimism symbolized by a graduation
ceremony versus the troubles facing the world into which graduates entered
in 1959. The magazine cover had now delved into the political realm.
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- BOY AND SHOPKEEPER - TAKING INVENTORY - YEAR END COUNT
- 1960, oil on posterboard
- 30" x 31", signed lower right
- Brown and Bigelow Four Seasons Calendar/Winter, 1960
- LNM #A160
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- "Calendars present a different problem than advertising, illustrations
or covers. Since they are intended to be lived with, to be hung on the
wall for twelve months, the ideas must not be too new, strong or startling.
So you must try to make up for this limitation by the use of color and
action. Often such pictures are most effective if they show people doing
things which the beholder or someone he knows might also do." -Norman
Rockwell