- The Norman Rockwell Museum at Stockbridge Fall, 1999 TH J N OUR LAUNCHES Norman Rockwell: Pictures for the American People • Before TV: American Culture, Illustration and The Saturday Evening Post • Eye on America: Editorial Illu . the 1990s t THE PEOPLE'S PAINTER THE NATIONAL SHOW CATALOGUE The People's Painter LaurieNortonMoifatt,D;<eeto. Nonnan Rockwell was the Troubled that his work was an anomaly Rockwell's paintings powerfully por­ people's artist. The public when compared to the leading art tray the universal truths, aspirations forms of the day, Rockwell went and foibles of humanity. His work is adored the work of this skilled through bouts of self-doubt and occa­ part of the fabric of America, and, storyteller. Rockwell received sional depression. He sought renewed at its best, it reflects and confronts bagfuls of fan mail that inspiration through travel, sketch class­ our most fundamental beliefs about applauded his finely honed es and relocation to new communities. who we are as a people. That is why, Through it all, he was driven to paint. late in life, he received our nation's sense of image-making. While He worked in his studio seven days a many viewers stared bemused week, even on birthdays and holidays. at Jackson Pollock's dribbled Work was his constant companion and paint and Picasso's fractured occasional demon. He simply could not not paint. He produced nearly 4,000 shapes, the people understood works, including 500 magazine covers Rockwell because he so clearly and images for advertising campaigns understood them. for more than 150 companies. However, among art historians and Often his subjects were his neighbors critics, Rockwell was a flop, derided and the ordinary moments from their by a 20th-century artistic community lives. "The commonplaces of America that could not abide his sentimental are to me the richest subjects in art," images with their reassuring mes­ wrote Rockwell in 1936. "Boys batting sages of American nobility. "His suc­ flies on vacant lots; little girls playing cess was his failure," said a 1986 jacks on the front steps; old men plod­ Game Called Because of Rain, oil on New York Times review that described ding home at twilight, umbrellas in canvas, The Saturday Evening Post, Rockwell's imagery as a "shovelful hand-all of these things arouse feeling April 23, 1949, cover. of stardust." in me. Commonplaces never become tiresome. It is we who become tired highest civilian honor, the Presiden­ An innovator who employed classical when we cease to be curious and tial Medal of Freedom, for "vivid and artistic techniques to tell contempo­ appreciative. " affectionate portraits of America." rary stories, Rockwell was an anachronism for most of his career. Many other Rockwell themes rose In a review of the 1972 Rockwell In 1949, approached by young art above the commonplace and were most Retrospective at the Brooklyn Museum, students at the Chicago Art Institute, poignant: the proud strength of Rosie The New York Times art critic John he was asked, "You're Norman Lhe Riveter; the democratic principles in Canaday described Rockwell as, "the Rockwell, right?" He puffed up with the Four Freedoms; the outrageous Rembrandt of Punkin Creek." Six pride at the recognition, but was injustice of bigotry conveyed through years later, in the Times obituary on stung by the comment, "My art pro­ the dignity of the young girl in The Rockwell, Canady wrote that Norman fessor says you stink!" Problem We All Live With. Rockwell was, "an amiable anachro- 2 1 nism," and in Time magazine, Robert Updike; "Rockwell's Hughes wrote, "Rockwell never made illustration is ... an impression on the history of art and excellence and cliche," never will." notes The New York Times Book Review art In November, Norman Rockwell: director Steven Heller. Pictures for the American People opens in Atlanta, Georgia. This seven-venue The Washington Post's @ touring exhibition will feature Paul Richard urges, seventy original works and all 322 "He's an American 1 of Rockwell's Saturday Evening Post master-seriously" covers. This will be the first major and Paul Johnson traveling exhibition since Norman notes in the London Rockwell's death in 1978. It will, over Spectator, "His work a two-year period, invite discussions is beginning to strike that explore and reexamine Rockwell permanent roots. as a force in 20th-century American Rockwell will be art and culture. In fact, the exhibition ranked among the Going and Coming, oil 011 canvas, The Saturday Evening Post, will serve to continue the vigorous Old Masters." August 30,1947, covel: contemporary conversation that already has begun by known figures Art historian Robert Rosenblum, Members of the art world are catching in the art world and critics who are taken with the "mimetic magic" in up with what the American people re(lecting on and reexamining Rockwell's paintings, reflects, "I'd have known all along. What a people­ Rockwell's role in American art. been taught to snicker at him ... but pleasing revelation! I'm happy now to love him for his " ... corny but cherished," says reviewer own sake. In order to enjoy Pictures for the American People Grace Glueck; " ... widely loved like no Rockwell's unique genius, all you opens November 6, 1999 at the High other American painter," writes John have to do is relax." Museum of Art in Atlanta, Georgia. Aunt Ella Takes a Trip, oil on canvas, Ladies HomeJournal, April 1942, story illustration. This story illustration is one of the almost 400 Rockwell illustrations 011 view in the national tOlH­ ing exhibition Norman Rockwell: Pictures for the American People. Copyright ~ 1942 by the Norman Rockwell Family Tru$t. All rights reserved. 3 THE CATALOGUE Norman Rockwell: Pictures for the American People Maureen Hart Hennessey, Chief Curator Norman Rockwell: Pictures for the American People begins its seven museum tour on November 6, 1999 at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, Georgia. Accompanying the exhibition is a 200-page companion catalogue of the same name. The most comprehensive volume to date about this icon-maker and visual storyteller, Norman Rockwell: Pictures for the American People catalogue is an important addition to any Rockwell fan's library. The quality of the Rockwell images are one highlight of the Thomas Hoving, former director of the Metropolitan catalogue. Here, eighty of Rockwell's most beloved paintings Museum of Art, New York, sounds the call for a reappraisal are included in full color. Original paintings from private of Rockwell. Noted art historian and curator at the Solomon collections, rarely seen in Rockwell publications, are fea­ R. Guggenheim Museum Robert Rosenblum places tured, in addition to favorites from the museum's own col­ Rockwell within the larger context of twentieth-century art. lection such as Triple Self-Portrait, Marriage License and Girl Karal Ann Marling, Professor of Art History and American at Mirror. Full-page details present a new way of looking at Studies at the University of Minnesota, explores the origins several popular images. Archival photographs provide a and evolution of Rockwell's Christmas imagery. A personal glimpse of the illustrator himself. response to Rockwell's urban scenes is offered by Neil Harris, acclaimed historian of The directors and co-curators popular culture at the University invited writers from a broad of Chicago. Dr. Robert Coles, range of disciplines and perspec- 1 Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard tives to contribute essays to the ;; Medical School and the artist's catalogue. The resulting volume :.t friend, eloquently describes the features a wide variety of view- ~ reaction by both black and white points. Fourteen authors shared ~ Southerners to Rockwell's historic . ~ civil rights painting The Problem their own unique approaches to 1"'" Rockwell, and their comments .~ We All Live With. u offer a fresh appreciation of his l § work, a deep understanding of ~ An incisive analysiS of Rockwell's @ the complexi ty of his pictures 1 The Connoisseur is contributed by and a reassessment of his place J Wanda M. Corn, noted historian both as a shaper of mass media of American art. Steven Heller, art imagery and within the American director of The New York Times Girl at Mirror, oil on canvas, The Sa turday Evening art canon. Book Review and author of Post covel; March 6, 1954. numerous books on illustration, 4 Museum, reflects on the art establish­ ment's changing views toward Rockwell. The exhibition's co-curators contribute three essays: Judy L. Larson, Executive Director of the Art Museum of Western Virginia, and this writer, Maureen Hart Hennessey, Chief Curator of the Norman Rockwell Museum, collaborated on a biographical essay; Anne Knutson, Guest Curator at the High Museum, examines Rockwell's relationship to The Saturday Evening After the Prom, oil on canvas, The Sat­ Post and the influence of the magazine urday Evening Post, May 25, 1957, cove r: upon the artist and vice versa; and this discusses Rockwell's place in the writer also looks at the creation of development of American illustration Rockwell's Four Freedoms and their since the 1950s. Professor of Art meaning today. Criticism and Theory at the University of Nevada and well-known critic of This first comprehensive analysis of contemporary culture Dave Hickey Norman Rockwell and his work brings a refreshingly original interpre­ includes the most current methods tation to some of the artist's most of visual analysis and cultural history beloved images-notably After the that examine his critical role in influ­ Prom-and portrays Rockwell as a encing American perceptions of progressive artist. Peter Rockwell, twentieth-century culture. Published by sculptor and son of the artist, reveals the High Museum of Art and the how certain paintings reflect his Norman Rockwell Museum at father's musing on his role as a artist Stockbridge and distributed by Harry and illustrator.