Sale of Rockwells shakes family and wider art world
Cash-strapped museum puts gifts on the block
NEW YORK STATE — Norman Rockwell liked the Berkshire Museum. In the 1950s, it was the first to display his work — a time when his illustrations delighted America but were scorned by the art elite.
Rockwell donated arguably his two finest paintings to the museum, and was friends with its director.
But now, almost 40 years after his death, the museum wants to cash in on Rockwell’s gift — a decision that has angered his family, thrown a grenade into the sleepy artistic community of Berkshire County, and shaken the art world.
“There is not a museum director in the United States who has not stepped forward and said this is an appalling thing to do,” said Michael Keating, a Boston-based lawyer involved in the case. “The reaction from the museum world has been explicit, and it’s been outrage.”
Elizabeth McGraw, the president of the museum’s board, defended the sale, saying it “held the promise of addressing our museum’s serious financial difficulties”.
The saga began in July, when the trustees of the museum in Pittsfield, Mass., voted to sell off 40 works, including the two Rockwells. The sale was intended to generate US$50 million, with Rockwell’s 1950 piece Shuffleton’s Barbershop alone expected to fetch around US$20 million.
It was a prospect that deeply saddened Rockwell’s three sons — Jarvis, a visual artist; Thomas, author of children’s books and Peter, a sculptor. “I used to get my hair cut in that barber shop,” said Thomas Rockwell, sitting in his home in New York State. “It wasn’t the cleanest place. But he was a wonderful old man.”
Thomas Rockwell, 84, agrees with his brothers that it is the finest of his father’s work. And, of course, he was alive when it was painted.
The decision to sell sparked a rash of lawsuits. On Nov 10, three days before the auction, the Massachusetts Appeal Court blocked the sale — giving the state’s attorney-general until December to complete her investigation into the legality of the sale.
The family does still own several Rockwells, but all are in the Norman Rockwell Museum, in Stockbridge, some 25 kilometres from the Berkshire Museum. Thomas Rockwell believes his father would have been stunned by the sums of money at stake — and saddened by the conflict.
“He hated confrontation,” he said. “He probably just would have gone back to his studio, and carried on with his painting.”