The Heckscher Museum of Art EXHIBITION GUIDE FOR TEACHERS Norman Rockwell, A merry Christmas to everybody! A happy New Year to all the world! (aka World of Charles Dickens), 1937. Mort Künstler Collection. Courtesy Norman Rockwell Family Agency. Norman Rockwell and Friends American Illustrations from the Mort Künstler Collection December 10, 2016 - March 5, 2017 WHAT S INSIDE 2 Prime Avenue Huntington, NY 11743 631.351.3250 Heckscher.org Education Department 631.351.3214 Education@Heckscher.org About the Exhibition...1 Artists in the Exhibition...1 Web Resources...1 About Norman Rockwell...2 Norman Rockwell Timeline...2 Exhibition-Related Vocabulary...3 Select Images...4
ABOUT THE EXHIBITION Norman Rockwell and Friends: American Illustrations from the Mort Künstler Collection features artists from the Golden Age of American Illustration. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, these artists contributed many illustrations to popular magazines, such as The Saturday Evening Post, Redbook, Good Housekeeping, and famous stories such as Moby Dick and Macbeth. The familiar characters and dramatic adventures seen in this exhibition capture the spirit of America. ARTISTS IN THE EXHIBITION Edwin Austin Abbey James Bama Walter Biggs Charles Livingston Bull Pruett A. Carter Howard Chandler Christy Joseph Clement Coll Dean Cornwell Harvey Dunn Robert Fawcett Harry Fenn Anton Otto Fischer James Montgomery Flagg John Richard Flanagan John Gannam Charles Dana Gibson Jules Gotlieb George Gross Frederic Rodrigo Gruger Winslow Homer Robert Kuhn Frank Xavier Leyendecker Joseph Christian Leyendecker Tom Lovell Charles Davis Mitchell Wallace Morgan Maxfield Parrish Joseph Pennell Henry C. Pitz Norman Mills Price Howard Pyle Henry Patrick Raleigh Frederic Remington Robert Riggs Norman Rockwell Saul Tepper Harold Von Schmidt Albert B. Wenzell Jon Whitcomb Newell Convers Wyeth WEB RESOURCES Dean Cornwell video bit.ly/deancornwellpaints Edwin Austin Abbey biography http://www.bpib.com/abbey.htm Maxfield Parrish information bit.ly/maxfieldparrishartist Norman Rockwell Museum nrm.org Video of Mort Künstler bit.ly/kunstlervideo - 1 -
ABOUT NORMAN ROCKWELL Norman Rockwell was one of the most popular American artists of the 20th-century. He produced over 4,000 original works in his lifetime. Rockwell tapped into the nostalgia that many people enjoyed, painting scenes of a kinder, simpler time. He had the ability to create visual stories that created the vision of a nation. NORMAN ROCKWELL TIMELINE Born February 3, 1894 in New York City Norman Rockwell Started taking art classes at age 14 Started working as an illustrator for Boys' Life magazine Created more work for renowned publications, such as The Literary Digest, Peoples Popular Monthly, and Life Magazine Attended the National Academy of Design and the Art Students League of New York At age 22 in 1916, Rockwell painted his first cover for the Saturday Evening Post During WWI, the army refused to enlist him, but he gained entry as a military artist Rockwell died in 1978 at age 84 in Stockbridge, Massachusetts In 1960 Rockwell took time off from work and wrote his autobiography, My Adventures as an Illustrator During WWII, Rockwell created the Four Freedoms series, which was inspired by Franklin D. Roosevelt Rockwell's illustrations in Look magazine in the 1960's were inspired by his ideas about civil rights, poverty and space exploration In the 1940's, Rockwell was artist-in-residence at Otis College of Art and Design in California, and his students occasionally modeled for his Post covers - 2 -
EXHIBITION-RELATED VOCABULARY composition: The arrangement or placement of objects or design elements within a work of art. depth: The perceived distance from front to back or near to far in an artwork. figure: The representation of a human subject in an artwork. gesture: The pose or the movement of a figure seen in a work of art. illustration: A visual representation or interpretation of an idea or a story, designed for use in published media, such as posters, flyers, magazines, books, video games, and films. narrative: A work of art that tells a story through imagery. overlap: The placement of objects over one another in order to create the illusion of depth. point of view: The perspective, or angle, from which a subject is shown. popular culture: Cultural activities or products that represent the way of life of the people of a particular time period. realism: Art that depicts how things actually appear in real life. repetition: When a color, shape, line, or other component of a work of art is used more than once. scale: The appearance of the size of an object in relation to other objects in a work of art. series: A group of related works, usually by a single artist, focusing on a particular theme or idea. still life: A work of art depicting an arrangement of objects such as fruit and flowers. symbol: An image that has a specific meaning or represents a particular idea. texture: The surface quality or feel of an object (ex: roughness, smoothness, softness). three-dimensional: An object that has length, width, and depth, such as a sculpture. In a two-dimensional artwork, images may appear to be three-dimensional. two-dimensional: A flat surface that has length and width, but no depth, such as a painting. - 3 -
James Montgomery Flagg, [Four Women], undated. Courtesy of the Mort Künstler Collection. - 4 -
Joseph Christian Leyendecker, Egyptian Queen (aka Cleopatra), cover illustration for The Saturday Evening Post, October 6, 1923. Courtesy of the Mort Künstler Collection. - 5 -
Dean Cornwell, Captain Blood ( From the old fort Blood surveyed Don Miguel s squadron ), illustration for The Chronicles of Captain Blood by Rafael Sabatini, Hearst s International- Cosmopolitan, July 1930. Courtesy of the Mort Künstler Collection. - 6 -
Albert B. Wenzell, [Woman Seated by Painting], undated. Courtesy of the Mort Künstler Collection. - 7 -
Norman Rockwell, Under the Mistletoe (Merrie Christmas), (aka Colonial Couple Under Mistletoe), cover illustration for The Saturday Evening Post, December 19, 1936. Courtesy of the Mort Künstler Collection. - 8 -