Mother Tucking Children Into Bed

Norman Rockwell used his wife, Irene, as the model for his painting Mother Tucking Children Into Bed.  Originally painted as a cover for Literary Digest in 1921, the painting features a mother tucking her two rosy-cheeked cherubs into bed.  Norman Rockwell painted a total of 48 covers for the Literary Digest.

Steven Spielberg and the Norman Rockwell Painting that Got Away

Spielberg had grown up in a home with Norman Rockwell paintings on the wall.

Russian Schoolroom circa 1967 courtesy http://totallyhistory.com/russian-schoolroom/.

In 1973, Norman Rockwell's painting Russian Schoolroom was snatched from a gallery wall.  By 2009, it would be the subject of a court case involving Rockwell collector Steven Spielberg (http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2009/10/spielberg-and-the-rockwell-painting-that-got-away.html).

Painted in 1967, Russian Schoolroom features a classroom of Russian schoolchildren seated at their desks, their eyes trained on a bust of Vladimir Lenin, except for one lone dreamer who lets his gaze wander.  The painting accompanied a series of articles about the Soviet Union published in Look magazine.  Rockwell based his painting on a reference photo from a Moscow classroom.  However, the inattentive pupil is actually paying attention in the photo.  Some have suggested that Rockwell's wayward student represents his political view about non-conformity.

                              

                http://www.culturevoyage.co.uk/norman-rockwell-does-it-matter-if-its-art/

Russian Schoolroom was one example of Soviet Russia.  At the time, the Soviet union and the United States were deep into the Cold War.  New film maker Steven Spielberg, had not yet directed his low budget film Duel which debuted in 1971.  Spielberg had grown up in a home with Norman Rockwell paintings on the wall.  Just starting out in his film career, however, he did not have the money to collect Norman Rockwell art.

Russian Schoolroom, which had disappeared from a Missouri art gallery, turned up in New Orleans in 1988 where it was sold at an auction for $70,000.  Steven Spielberg bought the painting from an art dealer, Judy Goffman Cutler, in 1989 for $200,000.  Twenty years later, the FBI traced the painting to Spielberg, seized it and transported it to the Las Vegas district court.  The court ruled in 2010 that the piece belonged to Judy Goffman Cutler.

In 2010, Spielberg, along with fellow collector George Lucas, lent fifty-seven Rockwell paintings to the Smithsonian for a display titled "Telling Stories:  Norman Rockwell from the Collections of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg".  Both film directors have referred to Rockwell's artwork as "cinematic".  More than just a picture, his paintings are a scene.  One can just imagine what has happened immediately before that scene and what might happen just after it.

http://eyelevel.si.edu/2010/07/picture-this-steven-spielberg-as-shadow-artist.html

Going and Coming: A Trip to Lake Bennington

Going and Coming, painted  by Norman Rockwell in 1947, features a family in a car on its way to Lake Bennington in Washington state.  It was published in The Saturday Evening Post on August 30, 1947.

The top picture, the Going one, shows a row boat named Skippy strapped to the roof.  A banner is attached to the side of the car announcing Lake Bennington.  The father drives with a fresh cigar in his mouth.  The mother looks straight ahead, her little girl perched on her lap.  One boy, his torso out the window, looks eager to get there.  The dog, his tongue hanging out, is squeezed between the boy and the window.  An older girl also looks out the window, a bubble gum bubble emerging from her mouth.  The other boy, in the back seat, with the same shirt on as his brother, appears to be his twin.  He is plugging his nose as if the father has just run over a skunk.  Beside him sits the grandmother, her eyes straight ahead, unmoved by her grandchildren's excitement.

The going picture tells a different story.  This time, we see the umbrella on the roof alongside the rowboat.  The father is leaning now over the steering wheel, his cigar nothing but a stub.  MOther is asleep in the passenger seat, just like the little girl.  Grandma looks exactly the same but her grandson, no longer plugging his nose, is drifting off to sleep.  His brother, in the middle seat, is still curious about passersby along with his sister, who is still blowing bubbles, and the dog, whose tongue is hanging out so much he looks overheated.  

http://wksu.org/news/images/21520/Going-Coming.jpg

The Dugout Cements Chicago Cubs Lovable Losers Image

"The Cubs, they ain't gonna win no more." (Billy Sianis, 1945)

The Dugout by Norman Rockwell courtesy 

http://www.best-norman-rockwell-art.com/1948-the-dugout.html.

It was a double header between the Boston Braves and the Chciago Cubs on May 23, 1948.  The Cubs lost miserably, 5 to 8 in the first game, 4 to 12 in the second.  Norman Rockwell captured the disappointment of the day in his painting The Dugout.

The picture features four Chicago Cubs players and their batboy.  The model for the boy was a real batboy named Frank McNulty.  He had trouble getting into character, however, because he worked for the opposing team. All star pitcher Johnny Schmitz, the next at bat, waits nervously in the dugout.  Three Cubs sit in shadows in the dugout, their chins resting in their hands, disgusted at the turn of events.  In the middle sits manager Charlie Grimm; perhaps he's thinking about the unemployment line.  In the backgrouns sit the hometown fans, jeering at the Cubs.  Their delighted expressions suggest that the Cubs have just made a grave error.

Some of the models in the crowd were related to real life players.  The girl furthest to the left is the daughter of Braves' coach Freddie Fitzsimmons.  The girl to the left of the batboy's head is Theresa Prendergrast, wife of Jim Prendergrast, one of the Braves' pitchers.  Rockwell himself appears in the upper left corner of the painting as one of the members of the jeering crowd.

Two years before Rockwell painted the watercolour, in 1945, a man named Billy Sianis bought two tickets to the World Series at Wrigley Field, one for himself and one for his goat.  Mr. Sianis, a Greek immigrant, owned the Billy Goat Tavern, named after a goat that fell off a truck and wandered into his bar 11 years before.  He adopted the goat.  Upon smelling the creature, Mr. Wrigley ejected the pair.  Mr. Sianis' response was;  "The Cubs, they ain't gonna win no more," hence known as the Curse of the Billy Goat.  After the Cubs lost the series to the Detroit Tigers, Mr. Sianis sent Mr. Wrigley a note asking:  "Who stinks now?" The team has not appeared in a World Series since 1945, hence cementing the moniker "Lovable Losers" (http://www.history.com/news/how-a-billy-goat-cursed-the-chicago-cubs).

Mr. Sianis, second from left, stands with Chicago fans and his beloved goat courtesy http://www.history.com/news/how-a-billy-goat-cursed-the-chicago-cubs

Saying Grace Voted #1 by Saturday Evening Post Readers

"There is a quiet order in the midst of chaos:  the variety of baggage, each person with a different coat and hat -- a unique visual identity -- the tableware, the cups of coffee." (Abigail Rockwell)

It's Thanksgiving Day 1951.  A woman and her son bow their heads in prayer as everyone looks on. "There is a quiet order in the midst of chaos." (http://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2015/10/08/art-entertainment/real-rockwell/norman-rockwell-and-faith.html).

Norman Rockwell based his painting Saying Grace on the Horn and Hardart Cafe, a railroad restaurant, on Juniper Street in Philadelphia.  A Post reader told him about a Mennonite family who took time to pray in a bustling diner, inspiring the artist to paint the portrait.  Rockwell photographed the scene in his Vermont studio, trucking in tables and chairs from an Automat in New York City.  One of the young men in the painting is Rockwell's son, Jarvis.   The model who played the lady passed away before the painting was published.

As Abigail Rockwell, the painter's granddaughter, points out, the painting is an exercice in contrasts. Contrast the young boy with the bowed head to the young man with the cigarette hanging out of his mouth.  Contrast the woman's carpetbag and umbrella, to the young men who are travelling sans valises.  Contrast the woman and boy's old world clothing to the industrial progress evident just outside the window.  "There is a quiet order in the midst of chaos."  It's almost as if time has stood still as the patrons in the cafe all stare in reverence at the pair with the bowed heads.  

Saying Grace was voted the number one magazine cover by The Saturday Evening Post readers.  IN 2013, the painting went up for sale; experts thought it would go for between $15 and $20 million. However, in keeping with its popularity, the painting sold for $46 milliion.

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/12/04/248790682/norman-rockwells-saying-grace-sells-for-46-million-at-auction

Happy Birthday, Miss Jones

Norman Rockwell used a real life classroom in Stockbridge, Massachusetts for his painting, Happy Birthday, Miss Jones, which graced the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on March 17, 1956.  The teacher, still holding her coat and hat, must have just arrived.  The chalk brush and chalk dust on the floor indicate some mischief took place before she arrived.  The student in the red shirt, although he is sitting up straight facing the front, has a chalk brush on his head.  "Happy Birthday, Miss Jones" is written on the blackboard.  An apple, an orange, a flower or two and a package wrapped with string sit on the teacher's desk.

Norman Rockwell credits his eighth grade teacher, Julia Smith, with encouraging him to draw.  Years later, Rockwell received a letter from Miss Smith's caregiver who explained:  "although almost blind, Miss Smith asked friends to describe Rockwell's covers each time they appeared in the post, and she reminisced about drawings he had done on the blackboard as a child."  Because of Miss Smith's kindness and dedication, Rockwell decided to dedicate a cover to her and all of America's "hardworking and underpaid teachers".

http://store.nrm.org/browse.cfm/school-teacher-(happy-birthday-miss-jones-teachers-surprise)-giclee-print/4,3007.html

Rockwell Visits Post in Philadelphia

"Because America was a nation of immigrants who lacked universally shared traditions, it had to invent some.  So it came up with Thanksgiving, baseball and Norman Rockwell." 

(Deborah Solomon, Smithsonian Magazine)

The Curtis Building in Philadelphia, which opened in 1910, was the headquarters of the Post, courtesy http://philadelphiaencyclopedia.org/archive/saturday-evening-post/#17037.

In 1916, the Saturday Evening Post was considered to be the premier place to showcase an illustrator's work.  Without an appointment, Norman Rockwell boarded a train for Philadelphia. Under his arm was his portfolio, filled with two paintings and a sketch.  The editors at the Post liked Norman Rockwell's idea and went ahead and purchased the two paintings.  Thus began a 47 year relationship between the Post and Rockwell.   He would paint 321 original covers for the magazine, elevating its subscription base to 6,900,000 nationwide. (http://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/post-artists/biography-norman-rockwell)

The American public couldn't get enough of Rockwell's work.  "Because America was a nation of immigrants who lacked universally shared traditions, it had to invent some.  So it came up with Thanksgiving, baseball and Norman Rockwell."  The public loved his patriotism, his commitment to American values.  

Rockwell did not receive the same warm welcome from the art world.  While most artists were starving, Rockwell was bringing in a steady pay cheque.  While most artists of the time were embracing Cubism, or Minimalism, Rockwell had his own "corny" style.  "While most avant-gardists were heading down a one way street, Rockwell was driving in the opposite direction -- he was putting stuff into art." (http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/inside-americas-great-romance-with-norman-rockwell-22055/?no-ist) 

Rockwell's style worked.  Called "the Dickens of the paintbrush", Rockwell is considered to be one of the premier artists of America.  

Baby Carriage was one of the two paintings in Rockwell's portfolio when he first visited the Post in 1916 courtesy http://www.allposters.com/-sp/Baby-Carriage-Saturday-Evening-Post-Cover-May-20-1916-Posters_i7553148_.htm.