How one little creature can affect the world around it

Norman Percevel Rockwell was an American painter and illustrator. His works have a broad popular appeal in the United States for their reflection of the country’s culture. Rockwell is most famous for the cover illustrations of everyday life he created for The Saturday Evening Post magazine over nearly five decades. In this painting, Norman Rockwell shows us how one little creature can affect the world around it almost totally.

This one little bulldog has caused quite a commotion. He has the whole alley blocked. He is not just delaying the workmen in the Pepies truck, he is keeping anyone else who wants to traverse the alley from completing their business. Twenty human characters are totally enmeshed in this little saga.

The violin student cannot reach his lesson and the violin teacher cannot teach his student. The lady on the second floor wooden balcony cannot finish her laundry. Apparently, this bull is her dog, since she seems distraught at his predicament. Her husband and child are also stuck watching the dog’s adventure.

The art teacher and student have taken a break to watch this show also. The mailman has stopped and is also watching. The window washer has stopped to watch. The cyclist and all the children cannot proceed down the alley to their destinations. Even the cat has stopped to watch the saga. A pigeon alights on the clothesline in response to the cat’s inattention.

Norman Rockwell’s painting of the obstreperous dog holding up the onrush of civilization depicts an alley near Seventh Street and Rampart Boulevard in Los Angeles. The Bekins Storage organization had a van which would cozily fit the alley, but it was a white one and the artist wanted red. So the owners had it painted red. which shows how convenient it is to be Norman Rockwell.

The models, denizens of the Los Angeles County Art Institute, include a violin teacher, upper right, waiting to give the hapless boy, lower left, an inoculation of music. Actually the boy could doubtless give the teacher a lesson, for the latter is Rockwell, who took two violin lessons when he was young and was advised to turn to painting or something.