Image: Norman Rockwell, 'The Oculist', 1956, oil on canvas, 30 × 28 in. Museum purchase, A0934,57.0003. Washington County Museum of Fine Arts, Hagerstown
Norman Rockwell’s ‘The Oculist’ (1956) has returned to view in the Kerstein Gallery at the Washington County Museum of Fine Arts in Hagerstown, Maryland. The museum, which announced the redisplay in its August 21, 2026 newsletter, calls the painting one of its most beloved works. No closing date for the display has been given.
The museum records the work as oil on canvas, 30 by 28 inches, acquired as a museum purchase with the accession number A0934,57.0003. It shows a freckle-faced boy in an optician’s office being fitted for glasses, his baseball glove at the ready and a Brooklyn Dodgers cap tucked into his belt; the optician keeps a good-natured expression while the boy’s frustration is plain.
The painting was made for the cover of the May 19, 1956 issue of ‘The Saturday Evening Post’, one of 322 illustrations Rockwell produced for the magazine between 1916 and 1963. Writing on the museum’s site, Agnita M. Stine Schreiber Curator Daniel Fulco notes that reproductions cannot convey the technique: crisply defined furniture edges place the viewer in the sterile office, the figures are carefully modelled, and while most of the surface uses a flat paint application, built-up paint on the floor in the foreground adds texture.
The acquisition history is part of the museum’s own story. The Washington County Museum of Fine Arts bought the picture in 1957 after then-director Bruce Etchison wrote to Rockwell’s dealer. Rockwell replied that the museum sounded like the sort of place where he would like to be represented, and — knowing the museum could offer only a fraction of his usual price — agreed to sell the Post cover showing the boy being fitted for glasses. Etchison later said he had asked after this particular painting because the boy reminded him of his own son.
‘The Oculist’ was conserved in 2021 for the museum’s 90th anniversary. The museum’s account describes cleaning, in-painting of very small paint losses, fresh varnish and the addition of protective glazing. The newsletter adds the names: fine-arts conservator Heather Smith of Maryland Art Conservation carried out the treatment, and frame restorer Ed Milburn of Studio Gilders refurbished the frame and added the acrylic glazing.
The Washington County Museum of Fine Arts is at 401 Museum Drive in Hagerstown and has been free to the public since 1931. Its published hours are Tuesday through Sunday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with admission and parking free, and its programming is supported in part by the Maryland State Arts Council, Washington County, the City of Hagerstown, and members and donors.
