‘Norman Rockwell Was Antifa’: Artist’s Granddaughter Bashes Trump Admin for Hijacking His Art

Public domain photographs via U.S. National Archives.

Norman Rockwell’s granddaughter lambasted the Trump administration for its use of his iconic paintings, pointing out that the famous artist was well known for being “angry at unjust prejudices” and expressing that through his artwork.

Throughout this first year of President Donald Trump’s second term, federal government agencies have approached social media and other communications with an attitude far different than previous administrations, frequently using memes and aggressively insulting critics, political opponents, and the media — and they’ve often run roughshod over both decorum and intellectual property rights in the process.

The Defense Department was criticized by the publisher of the children’s book series Franklin the Turtle for its unauthorized use of their reptilian protagonist. Memes posted by the Department of Homeland Security have been criticized for including what many viewed as thinly-disguised white supremacist slogans; DHS also received a cease and desist letter from the Chicago Sun-Times for “blatant infringements” of its photographs.

DHS has used or adapted Rockwell’s art multiple times this year to promote its messages, horrifying the artist’s granddaughter Daisy Rockwell, reported The Bulwark’s Catherine Rampell, who interviewed her at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Massachusetts.

“Protect our American way of life,” said the caption of a DHS tweet using Rockwell’s “Salute the Flag” painting.

 

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Another post “reproduced his famous 1946 painting of workers cleaning the Statue of Liberty, taking a symbol of welcome for the tired, poor and tempest-tost and superimposing upon it directives to ‘PROTECT YOUR HOMELAND’ and ‘DEFEND YOUR CULTURE’ by joining Trump’s anti-immigrant goons,” wrote Rampell.

The Trump administration had used her grandfather’s paintings “as though his work aligned with their values, i.e., promoting this segregationist vision of America,” Daisy Rockwell told Rampell. “And so of course we were upset by this, because Norman Rockwell was really very clearly anti-segregationist.”

In November, the Rockwell family — Daisy Rockwell, joined by Rockwell’s eldest son, and other grandchildren and great-grandchildren — wrote an op-ed slamming the government for the unauthorized use of his paintings and twisting of his legacy, writing that the artist had stood for values like ” compassion, inclusiveness and justice for all” and had a “deep commitment to equality and anti-racism.”

“If Norman Rockwell were alive today,” they wrote, “he would be devastated to see that not only does the problem Ruby Bridges confronted 65 years ago still plague us as a society, but that his own work has been marshalled for the cause of persecution toward immigrant communities and people of color.”

Rockwell had described himself as having been “born a White Protestant with some prejudices that I am continuously trying to eradicate” and “angry at unjust prejudices, in other people and in myself.”

“In other words, Norman Rockwell got woke,” wrote Rampell, noting how many of his paintings were originally intended as “wartime propaganda, meant to help rally support for America and its cause during the years of war against the Nazis.”

“As Daisy puts it, ‘Norman Rockwell was antifa’—literally,” she added. “So you’ll understand her indignation when President Trump began hijacking her grandfather’s legacy to promote what she considers modern-day fascism.”

Rockwell would end up “paint[ing] some of the most iconic images of the civil rights movement,” Rampell continued, including the 1964 depiction of 6-year-old Ruby Bridges being escorted by U.S. Marshals to desegregate her elementary school, a painting that “was radical for its time.”

In a video clip of their interview, when Rampell asked what she would say to Trump, Daisy Rockwell replied, “I wouldn’t bother, because I don’t think anything would stick.”

“Everybody in the family is outraged” by what DHS was doing, and how they were using her grandfather’s art to push their messaging was “just shocking and appalling,” said Daisy Rockwell.

Watch the video above via The Bulwark on YouTube.

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