Norman Rockwell

Happy Tax Day

Norman Rockwell prepared each of his magazine cover illustrations as fully realized paintings. It did not matter to him that his audience would see his work only in reproduction. The image reproduced would only be as fine as the work it replicated. More recent artists—David Hockney is one—whose work is widely distributed in reproduction paint for the more limited capacities of the reproductive process. That permits the artist to work faster, omitting those subtleties of tone and touch that are lost in duplication. Continue Reading

Norman Rockwell’s “April Fool: Checkers” originally appeared on the cover of The Saturday Evening Post , April, 1943. Go ahead, sniff all you like. But I can’t resist. Tell me, what is wrong with this picture? If you won’t play along yourself, try it on your kids. Or send it along to some other fan of Where’s Waldo? Careful, smarty. There are more “April fooleries” than you think. (Hint: There are forty three of them.) Click below for the solution to this, the least of your pressing problems: And while you do it, keep in mind that for all the fashionable scoffing at Norman Rockwell over the sweetness of his subject matter, he was a gifted painter. Continue Reading