Norman Rockwell and Black History Month

What on earth, you may ask, does Norman Rockwell have to do with Black History month?  Well, actually, lots!  How, you may ask?  Well, let me tell you!

Most people, those who just know Norman Rockwell's name in passing, would probably put him in a corner as an unimaginative illustrator, who only portrayed white-bred America, and nothing else.  And he certainly wasn't a real artist.  His paintings weren't real art.  Were they?

However, those of us who love Norman Rockwell's art (yes, I said art) know better. 

I grew up looking at a large coffee table book that my family had about Rockwell, and which contained a large number of his paintings, and something in me just completely responded to his style and point of view.  I would look at it for hours at a time, looking at my favorites as though they were old friends.  I loved his almost photographic realism, his use of detail, and that you felt like you knew how the people in his paintings felt.

Norman Rockwell is probably most well known for his portrayal of everyday America.  And some might argue that it is idealized, but it is also quite universal, because a lot of people did experience what he painted.

It's the collective memory of a nation--images binding all of us together, even though we might not have actually been there.

I absolutely love how he can tell an entire story with one small moment, seemingly frozen in time, just by having so many specific details.

This one reminds me of my mom, and a story she told me about her childhood,

while this one always makes me think of my dad (who grew up on a farm in northwestern Illinois), and his father.

This one makes me think of Jeff and our family's eternal love for the Cubs, even if they never win another world series.

And this one reminds me of myself, and my struggle to figure out who I really was, as I grew up.

I also love that Rockwell showed individual faith in a world that wasn't perfect, or ideal--something that we have to do as members of the Church.

Some people, looking back, have criticized Rockwell for not showing enough diversity in his art.  But most of his art was painted to be a cover illustration for the Saturday Evening Post; a magazine with very clear cut guidelines of what they did, and did not, want. 

As a matter of fact, I was very surprised to learn from the exhibit that the Saturday Evening Post had a policy to only show black people as servants on their covers.  And as I went through the entire collection of 332 magazine covers that were displayed in one room, that there was only one cover (one of his fairly early one's from the 20's) that had a little servant boy, who was black.  The other people on his covers were white, but from all different occupations, backgrounds, and economic status. 

I don't know, of course, but I believe that Rockwell didn't paint black people because he didn't want to show them just as servants, and that if he had had an opportunity, over the years, that he would have painted black families and individuals just as part of life, the way he did white families and individuals.

However, there was one other cover where I noticed a black man that was prominently featured, called "Boy in a Dining Car".

The museum had an explanation along with this painting that talked about how Rockwell was very sneaky with this cover, because he technically showed the man as a servant, working on the dining car, but the way he was painted--from the kindly expression on his face (which you might not be able to see very well because it's so small here), to his obvious position of experience, helping the boy figure out how things worked on a train (the boy is by himself, and trying to figure out a tip), and even the way Rockwell has the viewer looking slightly up at the man--makes the man and the boy not only equals, but the black man is the benevolent superior.

As time went on, Rockwell stopped being sneaky about it, and just put his values out for everyone to see.

Later on in his career, when he no longer painted Saturday Evening Post Covers, Rockwell painted what has been called "arguably the single most important image ever done of an African-American in illustration history."

This painting is based on the time when Ruby Bridges, a little African-American girl, went to an all-white school at the beginning of the end of segregation.  I used to look at this painting in my family's book, and feel so sad for that girl, and wonder why on earth people would throw things at her, just for wanting to go to school. 

Actually, I still wonder that.

One of the most amazing parts of the exhibit was an entire room dedicated to Rockwell's study and preparation for work called " Mississippi," about the murders of two young men involved in the civil rights movement.  There was a quote on the wall about how he started out with prejudices that were passed down to him, but as he "grew up" he became so disgusted with what he saw, that he made it a mission to change those perceptions.  He even used his son for the model of one of the young men, because he wanted to paint with enough emotion to get across his anger and pain about what had happened.

The image is shocking, sad, and real, which also describes Rockwell's work. 


I have also loved this painting since I was little, called "Moving In," where a black family is moving in to what used to be an all-white neighborhood. 

I love this because the kids are looking at each other, trying to figure out how to go about this new situation, but if you look closely, there are so many similarities between the black kids, and the white kids: baseball gloves and bats, pets, etc., even the way that they are standing.

How grateful I am for the truths of the restored gospel, that we are ALL children of our Heavenly Father, that each one of us has divine potential!!  Because however great, however infinite his love for me, that is also how much he loves each of my brothers and sisters.

So, yeah, Norman Rockwell, was "just" an illustrator, but he is also one of the most important American artists, with one of the most vital voices, in our history.