The sketches show scenes of people anticipating meeting the president as they hang out in the waiting room.
The White House Historical Association is bidding to reclaim a series of sketches by American painter and illustrator Norman Rockwell that once hung in the West Wing but ended up at auction after a family dispute over their ownership.
The association could face some stiff competition as the opening bid is $2.5 million and auction house clients have been lining up with offers.
The four 1940s-era sketches are titled “So You Want to See the President!” and depict people from all walks of life hanging out in the White House lobby as they anticipate meeting President Franklin D. Roosevelt. They were put up for sale by a grandson of the White House official who received them as a gift from Rockwell after a court battle over their ownership was settled.
The sketches are set to be sold by a Dallas-based auction house Friday. In keeping with its mission to help the White House collect and display artifacts that represent American history and culture, including the history of the White House, the association hopes to prevail. It wants to add the drawing to the vast White House collection of art, furniture and other items.
“They’re so different from any of the other art that was exhibited in the West Wing,” said Anita McBride, who sits on the association’s board of directors.‘Arsenal of democracy’
McBride remembers seeing the drawings in 1981 when she went to work in Ronald Reagan’s administration. They were a “focal point” when staffers took visitors on tours, she said. “People just loved seeing” the “wide array and depiction of Americans that have access to their president.”
The series, created in 1943 and published in the Saturday Evening Post during World War II, “offers an intimate and deeply human portrayal of American democracy in action,” according to a description on the Heritage Auctions website.
