Freedom from Fear (painting)

Freedom from Fear is a painting of Norman Rockwell and is one of his series of four paintings called the Four Freedoms. Rockwell was inspired to make these paintings since he heard the Four Freedoms Speech of American President Franklin D. Roosevelt of January 6, 1941.

 Background 
This painting was made public in The Saturday Evening Post of March 13, 1943, along with an essay of Stephen Vincent Benét. The other paintings of the Four Freedoms series are Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship and Freedom from Want, and were shown in other editions of the paper.

The painting portrays children laying in bed, a mother  tucking them in and a father watching with a newspaper in his hand, telling the stories of the war with the headlines "Bombings Kill... Horrors Hit...". The children are free from fearing these horrors of the war. He took Vermont neighbors as models for his series.

This painting is the only one in the Four Freedoms series he had not specially painted for this subject. He first made it to illustrate the Battle of Britain of 1940. He did not want it to be published though, because he distasted the idea that American children were resting safely in their beds as Europe burned.

The paintings toured through the United States with the motto Buy War Bonds. All together 1.2 million Americans saw the paintings and 132 million dollar was collected to be used in World War II.Michener Art Museum (8 augustus 2007) Pairs Famed American Illustrators Rockwell and Hargens for Fall Exhibitions in New Hope 

The painting can be found in the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

 References 
Parts of this article are derived from the article on English Wikipedia

Category:1943 paintings
Category:American paintings