Pictures For the American People

Photo of family taking part in this year's U.S. Naturalization
Ceremony, held at Norman Rockwell Museum. Photo by Jeremy Clowe
for Norman Rockwell Museum. All rights reserved.

So we continue into our next busy season at Norman Rockwell Museum. I have to say, the Fall is really a glorious time to visit the Berkshires— the colorful foliage is an artistic display in itself.

This past weekend I helped out with another U.S. citizenship naturalization ceremony at the Museum. This was our second time hosting (in partnership with the Berkshire Immigrant Center), and I'm really proud that we have gotten involved with such a significant event. It's hard to beat Norman Rockwell's artwork (in this case, The Four Freedoms) as an appropriate backdrop to welcome new American citizens; it's also inspiring to meet these individuals who have traveled so far (Pakistan, Ghana, Colombia, etc.) and worked so hard to become part of our country. With all the recent uncertainty about the U.S. economy and foreign relations (i.e. Syria), it is a reminder of how much the world still admires our country. And what joy on these new citizens' faces... I filmed and took photos of the event— you can view some of the latter on the Museum's Facebook page.

Visitors interact with the exhibition, "Norman Rockwell: Happily
Ever After." Photo by Jeremy Clowe for Norman Rockwell
Museum. All rights reserved.

This morning I'm helping to run our first live Google Art Talk. The online chat, which begins at 11 a.m. ET, will focus on Norman Rockwell's artistic influences— two of our curators will lead the discussion and I will be running their visuals for them. It looks really interesting, and I urge you to sit in or catch the recorded lecture, which will be archived on YouTube. I have spent the past couple months coordinating our involvement in this event; I learned about these new online art talks being held in Google Plus' Hangouts, and had approached the company about taking part. It's a live event, so hopefully it will go off without a hitch... similar to our involvement in the Google Art Project— read more about that initiative, which I also helped coordinate, here.

And speaking of technology, we had another nice article about our current initiatives, including today's Art Talk and our recent foray into QR code-enhanced exhibitions; I am quoted in this Berkshire Eagle article written by my friend/journalist Jenn Smith— I appreciated the mention of my video interviews, which are included in the exhibit.

Photo by Ben Garver for "The Berkshire Eagle."
All rights reserved.

Looking ahead, I'm getting ready to tackle my next exhibition video (Wendell Minor's America) and expand on some of our video production capabilities. In the meantime, I continue to play the part of spokesman— this week I conducted a tour and some interviews with travel writers visiting from Austria, and I have a short, live interview about the Museum scheduled for WSBS Radio this Friday, September 13, at 8:15 a.m. 

As if that wasn't enough, here is a link to a recent interview I gave to O Globo, a popular newspaper in Brazil. The article looks at the increasing popularity of Norman Rockwell, and the Museum's efforts to continue to spread the word about his art with an international audience. It's fun to see my words translated into Portuguese... heck, I'd be happy to travel to South America to take this global outreach one step further!...

Related Links:

Google Art Talk

2013 U.S.Citizenship Naturalization Ceremony (photos by JC), Norman Rockwell Museum Facebook page

"Culture a Click Away," Berkshire Eagle, September 6, 2013

"Retrato Do Século XX," Globo a Mais, August 16, 2013


"Pintura de ilustrador de revistas é a mais cara do acervo da Amazon Art," O Globo, August 18, 2013