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| Freedom from Want by Norman Rockwell |
This is one of Norman Rockwell’s most famous paintings, and it has been
seen to sort of represent the perfect holiday gathering. Grandma and grandpa
serving the turkey with the entire family gathered around the table. It, along with much else that Rockwell had to
paint, has become a symbol of a sort of lost time in America, except for the
fact that these times never really existed.
This image is a fantasy. It’s not even an event that ever took
place. The woman serving the turkey is Rockwell’s
cook and housecleaner, and Rockwell took a picture of her with the family
turkey. While her husband is in the
picture, it is not the man next to her playing the role of the grandfather, he
is the older man at the front left of the painting. And none of them were ever sitting at one
table at the same time. He posed them by
themselves in his studio and then took pictures to later use to compose the
image he wanted. Rockwell himself said
that he didn’t paint what was, but instead what he hoped to be.
We have sanitized, idealized and idolized this image, just as we have done with Rockwell’s other paintings, that this is what things are supposed to look like. This is what we are to strive for. And if we don’t make it look like this then we are missing something, because surely others are having these types of holidays aren’t they? And so we strive to have that perfect Christmas, and we strive and we strive and we strive, and yet we never quite get there, it’s always that allusive thing that’s just beyond our grasp, and so we simply say, “well next year, this is what we will do differently in order to make it perfect.” We try and live into this perfect picture, this perfect world, this perfect ideal, but not only can it never be, it never was either. And we’ve done the same thing with our story of the nativity as well, in order to sentimentalize it, we have removed it from reality.
We have sanitized, idealized and idolized this image, just as we have done with Rockwell’s other paintings, that this is what things are supposed to look like. This is what we are to strive for. And if we don’t make it look like this then we are missing something, because surely others are having these types of holidays aren’t they? And so we strive to have that perfect Christmas, and we strive and we strive and we strive, and yet we never quite get there, it’s always that allusive thing that’s just beyond our grasp, and so we simply say, “well next year, this is what we will do differently in order to make it perfect.” We try and live into this perfect picture, this perfect world, this perfect ideal, but not only can it never be, it never was either. And we’ve done the same thing with our story of the nativity as well, in order to sentimentalize it, we have removed it from reality.
