Know what I love about Rockwell? The hands. Artists always talk about how hard it is to draw hands. Rockwell, that dude could draw hands, and he knew it. He drew hands in this picture, through the doorway, when there was absolutely no need to, because he could. And if you look at a bunch of his pictures, he doesn’t just draw hands, he draws hands doing complicated things, making complex gestures, gripping fiddly little objects, he draws old people with wrinkled skin and funky joints on their hands… he was goddamn good at drawing hands and he was not shy about showing off his hand-drawing talent.
People calling him an illustrator and not an artist are just jealous of his hands.
Edit:
Hands:
When I was in college I had a professor who made the argument that Norman Rockwell’s work was best described as illustration rather than art. I think it was partly due to the realism and the focus on “normal” American life with a lack of interpretation or symbolism. But looking at this now I can’t help but think he was totally wrong. The look on the girl’s face that says “you should see the other guy,” the concerned adults having a conversation in the principal’s office, there is a whole story being told here in a single frame. To say this isn’t art seems crazy to me.
I have a print of this on wood. My mom got it from her mom. We’ve had it my whole life. I’ve moved 22 times. I’ve lost almost everything I’ve ever owned at least twice. Very few possessions make it through that many moves. But we’ve kept this picture the whole time. It always hangs in the kitchen, except for this time around when it hands above my bed in the living room.
The only other things we own that we’ve had even close to as long are a painting of Snoopy I pulled out of someone’s curbside trash, a red table we got off the side of the road, and some antique pottery and glassware of grandparents that hasn’t been unboxed since the 90s.
Edit to add, view from my bed:
Ignore the dust/cobwebs. I do not dust like I should.
Illustration major here. Art is such an overarching term that it can pretty much be used as an umbrella term for nearly anything and everything. Etymologically speaking, Illustration just means making something clear, to communicate some idea to someone else. The concept was modernized to encompass the use of pictographs, texts, and diagrams as visual aids.
All forms of illustrations technically can be classified as pieces of art, as the definitions of art vary wildly. I’ve always taken art to be anything that evokes an emotion novel to either the consumer of art or the producer of the art or conveys a novel idea either back at the artist or to the consumer of art, or some mixture of these. The key thing to me is novelty, which evolves and changes based off of sociocultural norms and personal experience. Again, totally my personal opinion, and fine artists in particular would be able to nitpick this idea to death. Conversations I still enjoy when I have the energy.
Rockwell comes from a very classic Americana age of illustration. Iirc he is at the tail end of the second golden age of illustration (though my knowledge on the history is very rusty). I always preferred the work of his predecessor, JD Leyendecker, and his predecessor, Alfonse Mucha. Purely from a technical standpoint, mind you. The content of their work, to be frank, I find quite banal.
As per this particular piece, it’s a simple narrative piece, obviously well executed technically in oil. The narrative is classic Rockwell. I think Rockwell has been ruined for me just because his work created a nostalgia for a time that never quite existed in America. Don’t get me wrong , I think Rockwell was a stand up guy, especially for his time period.
It’s just that his influence over the American Art and Illustration scene eventually ended up resonating with people who aren’t looking to art for anything more than familiarity, not novelty. Essentially, it’s kitsch. Rockwell unintentionally created the ideal white American past that boomers currently are nostalgic for. An ideal that has had negative ramifications for those of us who have to deal with people who vehemently insist that this idyllic Rockwellian world was the great America we should all return to.
Sorry to make this political, but art, like anything, cannot be divorced from politics. And intentional or not, Rockwell has contributed to American sociopolitical sentiments in profound ways. He practically invented modern Americana. And while it has its charm, I find it exhausting to see it everywhere.
In it’s worst manifestation, Rockwell’s legacy ultimately resulted in producing Thomas Kinkade, America’s richest, and arguably the world’s most evil painter. People like to say second most, but Hitler was always a Nazi first and foremost. Calling Hitler a painter is like calling Ronald Reagan an actor. Like yes, but maybe that’s not what he should be remembered for?
Anyways, the conflation between Illustration and other Artistic disciplines, as well as with differentiating between illustration and art, is a topic of discussion I find very intriguing and one rife with controversy, due in no small part to the ambiguity surrounding the definition of art in general.
Really interesting insights, and good point about the nostalgia for a past that never existed. The work of his predecessors is very nice aesthetically, and Mucha’s seems much more like what that professor would have gladly called art. A lot more stylization at least. I’ve always held kincade’s work in disdain because it struck me as the dullest pablum imaginable, but I hadn’t heard he was also evil. The invidious link didn’t work for me (I’m a filthy yt premium user) but I’ll look up more about that for sure.
He ended the Saturday Evening Post because he refused to ignore the civil rights era and was stonchly on the side of desegrigation and equal rights, and the post refused to ‘‘be too political’’ and stop hiring him for covers, and no one bought them without his covers.
Very cool, and good to know considering the points another poster made about his art being a driving force behind the nostalgia for a Better (read: whiter) past that has ruined so many American minds over the years.
Says quite a bit that they’d rather be broke than “woke”.
American racism is alive and kicking unfortunately
Nice
I would argue there is a deeper interpretation. That of the girls always told to smile to look better, yet she is obviously deshoveled and rough. But finds joy in the chaos that has ensued from her keeping to herself. The background being the stereotypical school of the time and she is there to shake up the system.
*Disheveled.
The rest, with attention, can be corrected yourselfly for clarificarity.
Art is so subjective that ANYTHING can be art. We’ve all seen the joke art that is a blank canvas with a spot in the middle or something. Your professor reminds me of someone who argues if a movie is a film or not.
Other kid not drawn because that kind of violence and gore would be unacceptable in the 50s.
(“You should see the other guy.”)
Chaos made a grave mistake in interrupting her mf recess.
There’s a former tough guy on his way to the hospital right now that severely underestimated that girl.
I respect his contributions to the game and I know this is a thermonuclear take but I fuckin hate Norman Rockwell’s art. The art style. The subjects he painted. Their facial expressions. The soup. Just not at all a fan of his whole deal.
No shade at OP for sharing this, though 🙏
It would cost you nothing to walk away and keep it yourself. There are plenty that think it’s brilliant. Nevermind extremely difficult to be this good at illustration.
Counterpoint, I’ve never met anyone who doesn’t like Norman Rockwell, so I’m interested in hearing their perspective.
I sort of understand where they’re coming from. In a similar fashion, I can’t stand the kid on the cover of MAD magazine. The best way to describe it is a sense of ancient queasiness but even that doesn’t accurately describe my discomfort, not to mention why. The facial expressions in the OP also give me that vibe, but to a much smaller degree.
*But that vibe is still there, such that I would never hang up a piece by Norman Rockwell anywhere in my home.
Hey, I know exactly what you’re talking about with the Mad Magazine kid. I’ve never liked that character. He’s always struck me as weird in an uncomfortable and creepy way. Like he’s stupid and perverted or something. I can’t really explain it, but I know how it makes me feel.
I think adults can and should disagree on things and feel free to voice opinions - especially if done as civilly as this. Not “this sucks” but just “it’s not too my taste”.
