Little Girl Observing Lovers on a Train

Rockwell came up with the idea for the painting when traveling by train with servicemen and their families.{{Cite AV media |last1=Mecklenburg |first1=Virginia |last2=Spielberg |first2=Steven |last3=Lucas |first3=George |title=Telling Stories: Norman Rockwell from the Collections of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6L2neYwOms |publisher=Smithsonian American Art Museum |accessdate=19 April 2020|time=18:23|date=26 July 2010}} The models posed for the reference photos in an unused rail car on a siding of the Rutland Railway. Rockwell was displeased with the area around the heads of the couple in his sketch that led to the final painting and covered the area with an additional sheet of paper to get the couple's pose right.

Little Girl Observing Lovers on a Train depicts a crowded passenger train car. A young faceless couple can be seen cuddling in one of the seats; their heads are together and their legs are intertwined on top of some luggage in the seat facing directly in front of them.{{cite book|last=Ciabattari|first=Mark|title=Social History of the United States: The 1940s|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xypn4djxVD4C&pg=RA4-PA249|series=Social History of the United States|volume=5|date=2008|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=978-1-59884-128-2|page=249}} The man's Army Air Force jacket hangs above the couple. The focus point of the painting is a six-year-old girl in the seat in front of the couple who is next to her mother. Unnoticed by the pair, she is kneeling on her seat and watching them.{{cite book|first=Richard|last=Halpern|title=Norman Rockwell: The Underside of Innocence|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FwF-AWzsLIYC&pg=PA33|date=2006|publisher=University of Chicago Press|isbn=978-0-226-31440-2|pages=33}} She appears to be uninterested in the intimate moment.{{cite journal|last1=King|first1=Claire Sisco|title=American Queerer: Norman Rockwell and the Art of Queer Feminist Critique|journal=Women's Studies in Communication|date=2016|volume=39|issue=2|pages=157–176|doi=10.1080/07491409.2016.1165778|s2cid=146889682}} The arm of the conductor, with a ticket in hand, can be seen in the background. The "Dixie Cup" hat of a United States Navy Sailor and the hair of his partner can be seen in the seat behind the couple.

Popular-art historian Christopher Finch found the painting to be a good example of Rockwell's matured style and compared the painting to a Henri Cartier-Bresson photo.{{cite book |last1=Finch |first1=Christopher |title=Norman Rockwell's : 332 Magazine Covers |date=2013 |publisher=Abbeville Press |location=New York |isbn=978-0789204097 |page=Location 2473 |edition=Kindle}}

The painting has been in the permanent collection of the Memorial Art Gallery in Rochester, New York since 1974. {{cite web |url=https://magart.rochester.edu/objects-1/info/664 |title=MAG Collection - Soldier on Leave |access-date=2023-11-08}}

The pencil sketch for this painting is in the personal collection of George Lucas and was included in fellow filmmaker Steven Spielberg's and his 2010 show at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.{{cite news |last1=Duin |first1=Steve |title=Norman Rockwell: George Lucas and Steven Spielberg open their vaults |url=https://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/steve_duin/2010/07/norman_rockwell_george_lucas_a.html |accessdate=19 April 2020 |work=The Oregonian |date=10 January 2020 |archive-date=23 May 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200523073126/https://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/steve_duin/2010/07/norman_rockwell_george_lucas_a.html |url-status=live }}

{{reflist|30em}}

• [http://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2009/08/15/art-entertainment/beyond-the-canvas-art-entertainment/listentothis.html/attachment/cover_9440812 Saturday Evening Post cover]

{{Norman Rockwell}}

Category:1944 paintings

Category:Paintings by Norman Rockwell

Category:Paintings of children

Category:Trains in art

Category:Works originally published in The Saturday Evening Post

Category:Paintings in the Memorial Art Gallery