Roundtable

Inventing America: Rockwell and Warhol

Wednesday, June 21
7:00 PM

Join Norman Rockwell Museum curators Stephanie Haboush Plunkett and Jesse Kowalski for a conversation about Inventing America: Rockwell and Warhol, the first contextual museum exhibition linking Norman Rockwell and Andy Warhol, two of America’s most significant visual communicators. By embracing populism, creating enduring icons, and shaping national identity, these celebrated imagemakers opened new ways of seeing art and our world. Creative forces in American visual culture, they looked out from different vantage points to influence and reflect, in unique and personal ways, the aspirations of a broad popular audience.
   On the surface, an exhibition pairing the art of Rockwell and Warhol may seem an unlikely choice. Rockwell’s familiar persona and artistic positivity can be perceived as the polar opposite of Warhol’s, which symbolized the New York counterculture of the 1960s. However, examination into their personal and professional lives reveals that they possessed many more similarities than differences. Each in his own way, Rockwell and Warhol attempted to eliminate the barriers between high and low art, employing humor and wit to celebrate the independent spirit of America and the power of the individual to shape destiny.

Join us for refreshments prior to the program at 6:30PM.

Pictured: Andy Warhol, Jackie, 1964. Andy Warhol Artwork © The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. / ARS, NY