“Rockwell, Roosevelt & the Four Freedoms” opened at the New-York Historical Society this week and is the first internationally touring exhibition devoted to Rockwell’s iconic depictions of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms. This 1956 portrait by Karsh hangs at the very start of the exhibition.

The traveling exhibition, which was organized by the Norman Rockwell Museum, Stockbridge, Massachusetts, explores how Rockwell’s 1943 paintings – Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Fear, and Freedom from Want – gave visual voice to Roosevelt’s call to the defense of freedom worldwide and took their place among the most enduring images in the history of American art. In addition to Rockwell’s Four Freedoms, the exhibition encompasses numerous other examples of painting, illustration, and more, by both Rockwell and a broad range of his contemporaries, as well as historical documents, photographs, videos, artifacts, and interactive digital displays, all on the theme of the Four Freedoms, from FDR’s initial enunciation of them as a reason to enter the War to their powerful post-war legacy.

Following New-York Historical, the exhibition travels to The Henry Ford, Dearborn, MI; The George Washington University Museum and The Textile Museum, Washington, D.C.; Mémorial de Caen, Normandy, France; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX ; and the Norman Rockwell Museum, Stockbridge, MA. Read more on New-York Historical Society website.

See another Rockwell portrait.

See Franklin Delano Roosevelt.