Spencer Douglass Crockwell

Three Boys, Woman's Day Magazine Cover

Medium: Oil on Board Signature: Signed Lower Right Father and Son, Women's Day Magazine Cover, January 1945 The illustrations of Douglas Crockwell were often simply signed “Douglass” to avoid confusion with the signature of Norman Rockwell, particularly since their work was being published on the covers of The Saturday Evening Post during the same period. Necessary too, because Crockwell also worked very realistically, and like Rockwell, was particularly good with children. Their backgrounds, however, were entirely different. Crockwell was born in Chicago, Ohio, and took his degree in Science at Washington University, followed by study at the Academy of Fine Arts in Chicago and the St. Louis School of Fine Arts. He received his first commission for a cover for The Saturday Evening Post in 1933, and this was followed by many more, as well as work for other periodicals and a long list of national advertisers. During the ‘thirties, he also completed Post Office murals in Vermont, New York State and Mississippi, and began to work on experimental animated films. The films, and inventing a “pan-stereo” viewing...

Approximate Date: 1923 Medium: Oil on Canvas Signature: Signed Lower Right Size: 38.00" x 25.00" Men depicted in a winter scene, used as a book cover ...

This work sells itself. Just look at it, and an elaborate explanation is not required. There is virtually no one alive who can paint a picture like Crockwell. Crockwell offers the viewer a complex and inventive composition by showing two wonderful portraits in the foreground and, beyond a broken wall...

Children were a large part of the homefront effort in America during WWII. Over 18 million schoolchildren volunteered with the American Junior Red Cross during the War, and this post...