Freedom in America

Normal Rockwell was the painter of the quintessential American homely scene — the middle-class families, the soldier, the white picket fence homes — of the 1940s and American nostalgia of the good old days revolves around the world he created. His paintings of the Freedom series were turned into posters that were sold to raise $133 million dollars for World War II.

Now a group of American posters have reinterpreted those works in the light of the Iraq war, the attacks on democracy in the US and a general mood of sadness in the nation. These edgy and disturbing posters are being exhibited at the Wolfsonian Museum in Florida. They capture the zeitgeist of a country that is beginning to ask itself how things went so wrong.

The posters can be seen at http://www.nytimes.com /slideshow/2008/07/08/arts/20080709_ROCK_SLIDESHOW_index.html