Norman Rockwell Books

I expected it to be a showcase of Rockwell's art with added text from great authors. It ends up being the inverse. The illustrations are hacked up from Rockwell's work and with such a wealth of christmas illustrations in Rockwell's portfolio I expected way more. Still a great xmas book to share with family. Dont but it for the art.

Norman Rockwell's Christmas book is filled with great stories, poems, and recollections of Christmas. But the real selling point...the main reason to pickup this book is the brilliant art of Norman Rockwell.

When we think Holidays...Thanksgiving, Christmas...we always want to picture ours to be as perfect, as joyful as one of Rockwell's paintings. They never are, of course, but we can still try.

Perhaps no artist ever has capture the sense of awe and wonderment of the Christmas season than Rockwell. You cannot help but smile ear-to-ear as you thumb through the pages. A Real Joy!

I first saw this book at my niece's home Christmas day; her husband had given it to her as a present. I thumbed through it and couldn't wait to get home and order it. Lovely illustrations and poems and stories. This would be a perfect Christmas present. Keep this in mind for this year's gift giving and keep one for yourself. You won't be sorry.

I got this book at a museum that was having an exhibit of Norman Rockwell's work. When I got home I sat down with it and flipped through. I love the Christmas pictures that he did. And the stories that were chosen are perfect for this book. I don't have children, but I can see how reading to them from this book would be a perfect childhood tradition to have. I am so glad I got this book.

This is an ideal gift or a treasure to keep for yourself. I am a 25 year old that has enjoyed this book with my family every Christmas since I can remember. The stories and pictures will warm your heart! It has been a tradition in my family and one I recommend for any family!

I have an Early 1970's copy. I bought it used and in the inner sleeve was written Merry Christmas 1972 Mom and Dad, From Bob and Carrol. I found this book is as old as I am and has lived another life altogether.

Anyway here's my review. This is the biggest Norman Rockwell book I have ever seen and I own 90% of the popular ones. This being said, i must comment on the greatness of the printing. Some paintings like The Land of Enchantment, A problem We all Live With, Strictly a sharp shooter, Yankee doodle and quite a few others are available in a gigantic fold out version in startlingly great color. Thats not all....The book is also full of small Prints glued into the pages. WOW!!! and to add to all that theres a Ton of color pictures printed directly in the book. Alternate sketches, Pictures he used as reference for the paintings such as shuffletons barbershop. I paid Under 5 bucks for this used and Its a crime. But its now one of my treasures and hopefully you'll get one too.

If you must buy only 2 Rockwell books get this one (Norman Rockwell Artist and Illusttrator) and The Saturday evening Post (The Complete Cover collection 1916 to 1971)

I have the one that is published in 1970. I have picture that can be removed out of mine, and I just love it I don't know if the 1997 published version has the same but I will never part with my book.

Just Great !

My mother bought this book in 1970 and it is a precious family treasurer. Our library board which is in the process of fund-raising for a new library is considering this book as a drawing card for donations for a give-away. It is one which board members said they would love to own. Mother's large heavy book has several large prints that can be framed. It's a heartwarming book which emphasizes the truth that a picture can say a thousand words.

My family is artsy, and when I was little, my dad or my uncle (I was too young to notice) gave this book to Grandpa for Christmas. It was the BIG GIFT that year. We all ooohed and aaahed over it. Grandpa and Grandma handled it so reverently. Whenever I would visit Grandpa and Grandma, I loved to sit down and look at every picture. (I had to wash my hands first.) This is a big book, like a coffee table book, with many, many pictures in full color, and big enough to see all the details. I could see how he painted each picture, how he handled the light, the expressions on the faces, how he made each person seem like someone you knew (or yourself), and how he make each story in the paintings reveal itself. The pictures are not shrunken down, black-and-white half-tones. They are reproduced like fresh Post Covers. I would sit there for a long time absorbing every page. I don't know if it has EVERY post cover, but it seems to, as well as other things like calendar pictures. When I grew up, I wanted that book so badly, so I went to a used book store (before the Internet) and bought it for $80, which was a lot for a young adult, but worth it. If you can get it for less, more power to you. This has more Norman Rockwell pictures than another Norman Rockwell book that I have ever seen. So if you only get one Norman Rockwell book, this is the one to get(except for his autobiography, which is hilarious.)

I was certain this was a 100 dollar book. It's a work of art. You will never get a book of this quality for so little money ever again.

The work shows important illustrations for the Saturday Evening
Post, his wedding and the Art Director's Club. Famous illustrations; such as, the New Tavern Sign are depicted.An
illustration of "A Family Tree" is presented in full color
together with other famous renditions of the artist. The Spirit
of Education and the Airplane Trip are presented in full color.
These were famous presentations in the Saturday Evening Post of
the 1930s. There is a famous Christmas illustration from 1929
and the "Dreams of Chivalry". The famous "Golden Rule" is
presented together with "The Prom Dress" and "The Outing".
This is an important work for ownership by anyone interested
in the modern artwork of the previous century.

I thought this book of Norman Rockwell's work was a fascinatining look into the typical/almost idealistic life of everyday embarrassing/comical/poignant situations which do commonly occur. The picture I enjoyed the most was "The Gossips" where upon I could imagine the tale behind the laughter and enjoy looking at the different facial expressions and that there was such a great twist to the tale. Thank you for such a great book!.

The book is small, but the illustrations still are reproduced extremely well. The essay alone is worth every penny. If you feel uneasy about your love for the work of Norman Rockwell, this book will give you the courage to like what you really like, without any more appologies. Buy it, read it, enjoy. You will, I guarantee.

Perhaps more than any other contemporary artist Norman Rockwell enjoys popular mass appeal with his warm scenes of Americana. His Saturday Evening Post covers, which he created for more than four decades, enchanted a generation, as he painted his particular visions of daily life.

His work bespeaks timeless values and tolerance, so much so that one of his ads was borrowed by an AIDS activist group to promote safe-sex awareness. What would Rockwell himself have thought of this? His son, Tom, said, "One of the things my father was associated with was tolerance. So I think it's fairly easy to know what he would have said."

I like this book for the excellent quality of prints throughout. I also has several fold-out prints that could be used for framing, and a lot of prints that I have not seen before in other books. Nice.

Christopher Finch has captured Norman Rockwell's magnificent and intriguing use of art to compile a work of American History. Each painting featured in the book is an amusing, yet truthful look at American life in the early 1900's and on. This book is a must to have in any home library!

if i wanted to have a complete culture in norman rockwell's art now i do.
this book is a very well made publication.
the art work is very well presented, pictures are great and high quality.
great purchase!

Great book with 659 illustrations and biography of Norman Rockwell written by Christopher Finch. Rockwell's life span (1894 to 1978) is depicted in his paintings and illustrations including Saturday Evening Post, Boys Life and portraits of the United States Presidents of his time. He captured the every day events and human expressions in his unique style that is very heart warming. This is a true classic.

I received Pictures for the American People as a Christmas gift and was delighted at the exquisite art as the pages unfolded. I collect all sorts of Rockwell works and this is truly the best I've seen. It explores not only the paintings, but what is behind them, the man himself. I felt as though I was being introduced to Mr. Rockwell through this masterpiece. It is a MUST BUY book! Even if you have never experienced one of his books or paintings, you will want to open this book again and again. The images are displayed in such detail and the stories behind them tell so much. You will be captured by the different aspects of art once you have seen what is inside. I will not spoil all this book has to offer, so if you haven't already purchased a copy, do so....or put it on your Wish List. You'll be happy that you did!

In a world that is completely inundated with so many Norman Rockwell books, I thought that i would never buy another one. I'm an artist and fan of Rockwell's but quite frankly there are so many other great illustrators out there, at times i wish that fewer books were written about Rockwell and more attention was given to other less known American artists like James Montgomery Flagg, F.R. Gruger, J.C. Leyendecker, Howard Pyle and Harvey Dunn, among many others. Then this book came along. I told myself I didn't want to buy it, I already have four books on Rockwell, I certainly don't need another. Then I opened the book and saw that the quality of the prints in this book are outstanding (the best I've seen) and the text is really informative. Now I'm telling myself THIS will be the last book I buy on Rockwell. This book will give you a new appreciation for Rockwell's skill as a painter and a colorist. After seeing these painting in person for the show that this book was written for, I can say that this book does justice to Rockwell's amazing talent.

Anyone who has wondered (even remotely) about Norman Rockwell's place in the World of Art will enjoy this book. In addition to 80 beautiful color reproductions of Rockwell's paintings, there are 14 essays about the artist and his work. The authors of these essays acknowledge that Rockwell was an anachronism and, to most people in the Art World, an object of derision. But each essay argues in favor of Rockwell's importance by focusing on one or more of his unique talents.

In "the Great Art Communicator", Thomas Hoving makes a very convincing case for Rockwell as an influential American artist. Rockwell's son Peter's essay entitled "Some Comments from the Boy in the Dining Car" (referring to the painting for which he was used as the model when he was a boy) offers invaluable insights into what the artist himself thought about his work. There is also an essay by Anne Knutson that tells the fascinating story of the Saturday Evening Post, its importance in the definition of "Americanism" and how Rockwell's relationship with the editor influenced his work.

The debate about Norman Rockwell's place in the history of art will undoubtedly continue. But as Laurie Norton Moffatt sums up in her essay "The People's Painter": "The personal transformation and communication that occurs when one looks at a work of art is the artist's defining moment. Rockwell was a master of delivering that moment to his public."

I can't think of anything better than flipping through this address book to look up the location of a dear old friend. For years, Norman Rockwell delighted people with his pictures on the Saturday Evening Post, and this book is a perfect reminder of those times. The cover and picture inserts bring life to the pages. For a man that to some of us was a part of our family, what could be better than having his genius stroked throughout a book where we keep the names of those we hold dear. It's perfect.

I was surprised and thrilled when I opened my box and found this lovely book. It's filled with Norman Rockwell's work, has enough writing space, and it seems sturdy enough to last a lifetime. I love it!

This book is a superior look at Rockwell's Post covers. The covers are reprinted in full and the color is superbly recreated. I own both this book and Christopher Finch's 332 covers and I must say that This book is better hands down. For one fact the Finch book illustrations are reproduced with a sharpness uninherant to the original covers that when compared with this book's full covers shows a pixelation and grainyness.

Finch's Book adds too much to the colors and too much sharpness that hinders the subtelety of some textures of Rockwells work.Many Illustrations show tiny white spots where resolution has clearly been tweaked.

If you must buy only 1 Rockwell book this is it. The covers are complete so headlines are included and give you more of a feel of the times they were printed in.The detail of texture is all here in all its glory.

In the liner notes the authors mention how gathering these covers for print was a labor of love and a testament to the genius of Norman Rockwell. I can say it truly is. GET THIS BOOK AT ANY COST. It is the true printed ode to Rockwells Post covers. Amen!!

A must have for the Norman Rockwell fan. This book contains ALL 323 Saturday Evening Post covers (1916-1971), all reproduced in their original full size and in full color. Each cover is described with interesting background on Norman Rockwell's inspiration for painting them.

To her string of biographies of famous people, Beverly Gherman has added another winner with Norman Rockwell, Storyteller With A Brush. While it is written for and marketed to young readers, this easy read will inform, delight and inspire anyone of any age with a curiosity about what makes great people tick, and how they got to be great. A passion for his art is an added bonus, as the book is sprinkled generously with Rockwell illustrations. It's also a walk down memory lane for history buffs, for Rockwell did indeed capture the story of American culture and history from the first World War into the late sixties.

Gherman does a great job getting behind the scenes. We learn about Rockwell's childhood in New York City and, in summers, on a farm, and his very early realization that he loved to draw, and had a gift. She treats us to photographs of Rockwell at work, whether in a drawing class sketching a model or working in his own studio. What jumps out is not just Rockwell's innate talent but his tremendously hard work to improve his craft. Equally tenacious was his initiative in bringing his work to market, or, one might say, creating a market for his work. We can feel his powerful ambition as a young illustrator to break into the big times - of which the cover of the Saturday Evening Post was the epitome. We can feel his nervousness and anticipation as he waits in the lobby of that magazine's head office in Philadelphia for an art editor to review the three paintings he had brought with him from New York. Finally, we imagine his joy when they buy his work on the spot and commission additional covers, starting a nearly half century long relationship and the seemingly endless series that became his hallmark.

It is difficult to imagine an artist, throughout his career, spending more time on understanding his subjects than Rockwell. Gherman tells the story of his exploration in 1935 of Mark Twain's hometown, Hannibal, Missouri, to help him prepare to illustrate Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. He even bought worn clothes from farmers for pants and overalls, then hired models to wear them while he painted.

We watch as Rockwell decides to leave the Post in 1963, after almost fifty years, to try something new at nearly seventy years of age. He reveled in painting more contemporary, as opposed to historical subjects, now for Look Magazine. Thus we are the beneficiaries of another stream of his sketches and paintings, this one documenting the space program, integration, the fight against poverty and other social issues and developments.

Finally, we respect the admiration his hometown expresses with a parade only a couple of years before his death, and his determination to continue painting as long as possible; and we puzzle at the relative lack of contemporary acclaim art critics bestowed.

Gherman has done reading audiences a great service in presenting the life of this fascinating artist in such a compelling format.

My first thought when I picked up "Norman Rockwell: Storyteller With a Brush" was why Beverly Gherman had selected "The Soda Jerk," the painting that appeared on the August 22, 1953 cover of the "Saturday Evening Post" for the cover of her book. Part of it has to do with Gherman's emphasis on Rockwell's art depicting kids throughout this book for young readers, but then I noticed that the painting on the back cover is "Norman Painting 'The Soda Jerk,'" also from 1953.

Normal Rockwell was the premier American illustrator of the 20th century and it is hard to think that in this century where computers have been added into the mix along with photography that anybody is ever going to replace Rockwell in the pantheon of American artists. Certainly no one will be more identified with Americana than the man who painted the "Four Freedoms" series and all those "Saturday Evening Post" covers. But Gherman goes beyond those famous works to include those illustrations Rockwell did for editions of Mark Twain's "Tom Sawyer" and "Huckleberry Finn." Opposite the book's first chapter is Rockwell's "Triple Self-Portrait" (1960), which has to be one of the two most famous ones ever done (and the artist includes the other, of Vincent Van Gogh, tacked on the canvas he paints himself doing).

Gherman tells how an awkward boy grew up to become a famous illustrator. Young artists can identify with a boy who starts off sketching characters from Charles Dickens' novels (substituting J.K. Rowling of course). Still, dropping out of school at the age of fourteen to study art and begin a career that ends up capturing the heart of an entire nation mean something different a century ago when Rockwell did it. Gherman traces how Rockwell's experiences in life became parts of paintings as well as how he went on to paint some of he most people of his time, but that above all it was his more intimate American scenes that make his work so memorable.

There are over two dozens examples of Rockwell's paintings included in "Storyteller With a Brush," along with photographs showing the artist at work and some of his models. The final painting, which Gherman deals with at some length, is "The Problem We All Live With," a 1964 work for "Look" magazine showing Ruby Bridges, an eight-year-old black girl, being escorted to a New Orleans school by four federal marshals. The choice is a particularly fine tribute to Rockwell's true vision of the American spirit and the nice thing is that when young readers go through this book it is just their introduction to Rockwell's body of work, because there are so many more great paintings out there to be discovered.

This Calendar has many of the classic Rockwell paintings. Nice paper stock.

"The extraordinarily gifted illustrator Norman Rockwell (1894-1978) came of age just as a new audience and market for illustration were opening up. Mass-circulation magazines catapulted artists' work into millions of American homes, and Rockwell was the right talent at the right time. In 1916, he sold his first cover to The Saturday Evening Post, beginning a relationship that would endure through hundreds of covers and nearly 50 years.

"Rockwell's work grew in breadth and character as he refined his storytelling art, producing evocative, nostalgic vignettes of small-town America. By the 1940s, Rockwell was a household name and a national treasure. This engagement calendar captures the warmth and humor of Norman Rockwell with thirty-two of his classic cover illustrations for The Saturday Evening Post.

"112 page, spiral-bound weekly engagement calendar with 32 full-color reproductions of paintings (not prints) by Rockwell and clear plastic covers. Size: 6 5/8 by 8". Calendar features 53 weekly grids, 12 full-page monthly grids, and double-page spreads of yearly grids for 2006 and 2007. Includes international holidays, calling codes, time differences, personal information page, and pages for notes. Published with the American Illustrators Gallery. ISBN 0-7649-3032-X. Click on the small picture to see an inside page. Additional publications available in our Rockwell Gallery."--© Pomegranate

Halpern's look at the art of Rockwell is fascinating. As someone who has always appreciated Rockwell's story-telling and technical expertise, I was surprised by what Halpern was forcing me to look at for the first time ever. Halpern points out that there is no accident in an artist's choices and compositional decision-making. Whether Rockwell was making conscious or sub-conscious decisions in his in-frame arrangements may ultimately be beside the point. After reading Halpern's account, you may not look at a Rockwell's prints, calendars, or coffee mugs quite the same way again.
Halpern is successful in walking the line between pure academia and a book written for the masses. He also ends this volume nicely, pointing out those fine artists who have -- in one way or another -- carried on Rockwell's on-canvas story-telling.

While Norman Rockwell's paintings are generally seen as imagery of all-American virtues, values, individuals, and scenes, the John Hopkins English professor Halpern sees them as "more challenging and complex" than even the most sophisticated critics have imagined in the recent revival of interest in Rockwell; which revival has mostly reaffirmed the general regard of his paintings. Halpern looks to Rockwell's famous painting "Triple Self-Portrait" for indication--and in a way confession--that there was more to Rockwell's paintings than is realized from the first impressions of their imagery and recognition and often identification with their subjects. Rockwell's insistent, undying "jokey inventiveness," evidenced more directly in his autobiography "My Adventures as An Illustrator," is seen in the often overlooked details of his paintings. The woman in "Rosie the Riveter" celebrating American women's role in the war effort of WWII has Irish facial features which identify her with the ethnic and working classes, not the middle-class matrons, businessmen, and shop owners who see their mainstream, traditional values represented by Rockwell. Also, Rosie's muscular arms go against the typical image of women as slender and in need of male protection. Halpern similarly interprets details of other paintings to find symbols or intimations of homosexuality, voyeurism, and other sexually-laden topics. Halpern does not go so far as to make Rockwell out to be lascivious or meanly subversive. The author does, however, argue and abundantly demonstrate the point that Rockwell's paintings are more complex, more Freudian, than this painter openly admitted to and than nearly all viewers realize.