This week, while I knew I’d be
making a video on Norman Rockwell, I stumbled upon this comment on a Modern Art
Facebook page. It was found under an image of François-Rupert Carabin which got critiqued by
the page members for being too sensual. It said: “This group full of people who think most
depictions of the human form is somehow 'seedy' or 'soft porn' is fast becoming a real
joke. You should be ashamed calling yourself lovers of modern art. I so had it. Pathetic
prudes. Go look at some Norman Rockwell.” It’s through illustrating the very popular
Saturday Evening Post that Norman Rockwell will be known throughout America. Keep in
mind, television was just starting to make a breakthrough in American households,
so if you wanted any kind of visual entertainment at your home, magazines
were pretty much the only option. This meant that any artist illustrating for these
magazines would reach fame and recognition. Rockwell often painted the innocence of kids, comical scenes or just cute typically American
images. Since his illustrations were meant to be shown to such a broad public, it was,
to many people, tame, bland and boring. As the Facebook comment noted,
Norman Rockwell is known to be bland, apolitical and marketable
as seen in this commercial: ... but if you go back just a few
seconds, you see, in the background, one of Rockwell’s first paintings
which could be considered political. Let’s take a look at Norman
Rockwell’s political art. The painting is simply called Freedom of
Speech. When Rockwell attended a local town meeting, he saw someone voicing his
disagreement. He was the only contestant, yet people still listened respectfully and
attentively. He looks a bit like Abraham Lincoln and most people in the composition
are looking at him, even Rockwell himself. This painting is political because of its
subject-matter, but also because it’s the first painting in Norman Rockwell’s Four
Freedoms series, which is directly inspired by Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1941 State of the
Union Address where he identifies 4 freedoms: These four freedoms were a way to draw an
ideological line between the United-States and Nazi Germany. The Nazis had invaded a large
part of Europe and they were in the process of attacking England. Roosevelt was preparing the
United-States for a possible intervention in the war and he was also establishing what a
post-war world would look like. It greatly inspired Rockwell who really wanted to contribute
to the war effort. The four freedoms series was political propaganda designed to entice
people to go to war; to defend America and its values. The Office of War Information, or the
institution in charge of war propaganda in the US, used Rockwell’s paintings, sold them as posters
and collected, just from Rockwell’s art, 132 million dollars in war bonds. Let’s
take a close look at these paintings. The first Freedom was Freedom of Speech as seen
earlier. The second was Freedom of Worship which is the least popular artwork of this series. It’s
extremely crowded and many people are praying, all in different ways. Some with religious
text, others with a rosary necklace, some with their hands joined together and
some without any formal way of worshipping. We’ll skip to the fourth Freedom which is
Freedom from Fear. You see here two parents putting their two children to bed, hoping
that their security would never be in danger, hoping that they’d never have to live in
fear. In his left hand, the father holds a newspaper on which you can read “bombings”
and “Horror”. The idea here is that we have to fight for our kids’ future so that tomorrow,
when they wake up, they’ll feel safe and free. The third freedom is Freedom from Want, or
Rockwell’s Thanksgiving. There is, at the centre of the frame the traditional turkey served
by the motherly figure. The table is surrounded by people and is overlooked by the fatherly figure.
It’s a very traditional and idealized version of a thanksgiving feast. Interestingly enough,
though this painting is arguably the most popular of the series, it’s also the freedom
that is the least liberal. Freedom of Speech, Worship and Fear all go without saying, but
freedom from Want, especially in America today, wouldn’t be considered an essential freedom. If
anything, American culture doesn’t want to free us from want, but rather it encourages it. Our
culture stimulates want, it manufactures it. The fact that these freedoms weren’t even
respected by the country defending them really disappointed Rockwell. After
WWII, there was a lot of hope for a new and better world. By the 1960s, this hope
died. Freedom from Fear was definitely a lie as America’s violent interventions in lesser
developed countries was spreading terror: Rockwell notably opposed the Viet-nam War. Freedom
of Speech was also hardly respected for a large part of the population as racial segregation
made African-Americans second-class citizens. Norman Rockwell would focus on this last issue. When asked why he didn’t paint
many black people in the past, he answered that it was because the Saturday
Evening Post, the magazine he used to work for, didn’t allow it. Painting African-Americans
would be too disturbing to the audience. This is where Norman Rockwell will voice an even
stronger political position through his art. He resigned from the Saturday Evening Post and, in
1964, he painted The Problem We All Live With. The topic is pretty self-evident for anybody
who knows the story of Ruby Bridges and the New Orleans school desegregation
crisis of 1960. In 1960, two all-white elementary schools in New-Orleans were forced
to accept black students. Riots were sparked, parents boycotted the school and every
teacher except one refused to teach. Ruby Bridges was six years old when she
showed up to her first day of class in a formerly all-white school. She was escorted
by four federal marshals while protestors violently demonstrated their disapproval by
throwing things and yelling out racial slurs. Here, in Rockwell’s painting, you see
the reenactment of the whole event: You see Bridges, the men escorting her, the
protests and the slurs. We’re looking at the young girl going to school from the perspective
of the protestors. The focus is on her because we can’t even see the men’s faces, but
also because the composition beautifully frames her. I also really like how Rockwell
doesn’t place her in the center of the frame, but slightly ahead, as if she was very
excited to go to school. It shows a great display of confidence which is also
demonstrated through her strong posture. Rockwell is taking a strong stance
for desegregation which he also did through the paintings Southern Justice
and New Kids in the Neighbourhood. In The Problem We All Live With, the child’s
innocence is contrasted with the violence of the adult world. In New Kids in the Neighbourhood,
the children’s charming innocence is shown through their curiosity, their awkwardness and the
will, from both sides, to play baseball. What’s amazing in these later paintings is that, while Norman Rockwell did decide to create
more serious and controversial images, he still did it through his typical and
sensitive depiction of child innocence. Thank you for watching! Special thanks
to Isaac and every other patron for supporting us! If you also want to support
us, check us out on patreon.com/thecanvas
