American Art

Norman Rockwell

I Paint the Candidates (Norman Rockwell at the Barber)

Auction Closed

November 22, 10:23 PM GMT

Estimate

100,000 - 150,000 USD

Lot Details

Description

Norman Rockwell

1894 - 1978

I Paint the Candidates (Norman Rockwell at the Barber)

initialed n / r and inscribed Norman Rockwell (lower right)

pencil on paper

sheet: 11 by 10 inches (27.9 by 25.4 cm)

framed: 28 by 27 inches (71.1 by 68.6 cm)

Executed in 1964.

The artist
Bill and Ma Meyers (gift from the above)
[with]Martin Diamond Fine Art, New York
Eleanor Ettinger, New York, 1979 (acquired from the above)
Estate of the above
Acquired by the present owner from the above

Norman Rockwell, "I paint the candidates," Look Magazine, October 20, 1964, p. 51, illustrated
Thomas S. Buechner, Norman Rockwell, Artist & Illustrator, New York, 1970, no. 561, n.p., illustrated
Christopher Finch, Norman Rockwell's America, New York, 1975, p. 321, illustrated
Laurie Norton Moffatt, Norman Rockwell, A Definitive Catalogue, vol. II, Stockbridge, Massachusetts, 1986, no. S402, pp. 694-95, illustrated

New York, Bernard Danenberg Galleries; Fort Lauderdale, Florida, The Fort Lauderdale Museum of the Arts; Brooklyn, New York, The Brooklyn Museum; Washington, D.C., Corcoran Gallery of Art; San Antonio, Texas, Marion Koogler McNay Art Institute; San Francisco, California, M.H. De Young Memorial Museum; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Oklahoma Art Center; Indianapolis, Indiana, Indianapolis Museum of Art; Omaha, Nebraska, Joslyn Art Museum; Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Norman Rockwell, A Sixty Year Retrospective, February 1972-April 1973, p. 130, illustrated
Osaka, Japan, Hankyu Department Store; New York, Bernard Danenberg Galleries, Norman Rockwell, April-June 1975

Throughout the 1950s and 60s, Norman Rockwell painted numerous portraits of U.S. Presidents, presidential candidates and their spouses in a series entitled I Paint the Candidates. The most notable works from this series include the now famous depictions of John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon from 1960. The present work also belongs to this series and was published in the October 20, 1964 issue of Look Magazine with the caption, “Before a painter goes to the White House, he had better get a haircut and listen to an expert explain politics.” Although the present work was previously recorded as bearing an original artist’s inscription reading ‘My best wishes to Bill and Ina / Meyers / Sincerely, / Norman Rockwell’ it was later removed.