Norman Rockwell

Norman Rockwell: Segregation

Introduction:

The pictures we you are going to explore are from the American artist Norman Rockwell who works in the United States who speaks civil rights of African Americans. The work is entitled "New kids in the neighborhood" created in 1967 and “The problem we all live with” created in 1963.

Analyze:

New kids in the neighborhood were created in 1967. This table is a work of painting with oil-on-Star. In this table we observe the removal of an African American family on a residential area hitherto reserved for whites. It is the right of African-American families. Norman Rockwell present difficulties to impose the idea of integration of African Americans in a white society by repelling them. In this painting we can see:

-Eye-catching white clothes on black children (show innocence) and the colorful clothes of white children (there was a blond girl, a brown boy, a red-haired boy).

-In the center of the painting we can see the empty space symbolizing the lack of contact between the two communities and their apparent differences.

-The similarities are many yet or shown as complementary (a white cat on the arm of the black girl and a black dog next to white children’s. This representation can be considered as ironic)

-Many questions are asked by the artist to his public: Will they play baseball together? Will they talk? Who is going forward first?

To achieve his paintings, Norman Rockwell works based on photographs, this artistic current is called hyper- realism, he sketches and paints with much diluted oil.

But this picture was not his first on the civil rights of African Americans. «The problem we all live with” was created in 1963; it is oil on canvas. He speaks of a girl who was the first African-American child to integrate a white school in the United State. In her first day she was escorted by federal agents. Only one teacher agreed to make progress with it . The child has been subjected to insults and throwing projectiles. Norman Rockwell recounts this event on a table.( It can be seen from the table, the girl accompanied by federal agents, A tomato crushed against the wall . We can guess that someone threw it If we look closer you can see writing on the wall «Nigger “.

Conclusion:

Finally, we chose these pictures because they are realistic and also because they look like photographs, knowing that Norman Rockwell’s paintings are based on real photos. These tables also show us the reality of the time in which the suffering of those who were involved.

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