Rockwell Reinventor Tours New Freedoms

Before he was Artist in Residence at the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination, Pops Peterson had never planned to be involved in civil rights work. But he says life and circumstances led him to feel "drafted" into action.


Known in the area for his works emulating the Berkshire County icon Norman Rockwell, Peterson' s image "Freedom from What" will be going on tour as part of a larger traveling exhibit, "Enduring Ideals: Rockwell , Roosevelt & the Four Freedoms," which opens in New York City in May. It will then travel the world before concluding in Normandy , France.

Peterson's works in his "Reinventing Rockwell" series emulate the iconic illustrator's style while tackling contemporary issues of diversity, social justice and what it means to be American. He received a civil rights award in 2015 at the Annual Fair Housing and Civil Rights Conference in Springfield for the works, which have also been featured in the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge.

"I wanted to show that women can be in uniform, to show that there are people of color living in the neighborhood," Peterson said. "We're talking not just about Stockbridge but the American landscape. Rockwell is Mr. America. You think of the American homeland and you think of a Norman Rockwell picture. And [for most of Rockwell's career] that was all white people except there might be a maid or a train conductor who's black."

In one work. "The Education of Will Cisneros," Peterson reimagines Rockwell's image "Willie Gillis in College," replacing the white veteran returning from World WW II with a veteran of color returning from Afghanistan. In the lower corner of Peterson's illustration we see that Cisneros' right leg is a prosthetic and that he has a prescription bottle.


"I'm not focusing on this disability," Peterson said. "I'm trying to show someone who has made bis sacrifice for his country and now has a full life. He goes to college, he rides a bike, he plays guitar, here 's his Purple Heart."

Another of his works, "Freedom from Shame," depicts a young hockey player triumphant in the locker room with champagne running down his face and standing completely unselfconscious to have a missing segment of his arm. The work was part of a continuing relationship between Peterson and the Massachusetts Office on Disability.


In Rockwell's later years, he also forayed into civil rights-focused artwork, Peterson said. Particularly with his iconic 1964 painting "The Problem We All Live With" which depicts Ruby Bridges, a six-year-old African-American girl, walking to a white school during the New Orleans desegregation crisis as she is barraged with graffiti and rotten fruit .

Peterson's answer to "The Problem We All Live With" is "The Problem Persists," which shows Bridges walking through wreckage, in Ferguson, fifty years after the original image appeared.


Peterson's work begins with photos, then he uses digital tools and hand drawing to make them look more like paintings and give them his unique unique style. He works at a studio space on the border of West Stockbridge and New York, for which be was given keys by a friend, Rob Grien. who also appeared in Peterson's image "Freedom from Discrimination."