The Miami Cuban American Museum

presents the four freedoms exhibit

In honor of the Cuban American’s fight for freedom, the Miami Cuban American Museum (MCAM) is honored to showcase Norman Rockwell’s iconic Four Freedoms series as part of the museum’s Freedom Month. This exhibit will run from April 1, 2021 to April 30, 2021, in celebration of the iconic date of April 20, 1980, when the Castro regime announced that all Cubans wishing to emigrate to the U.S. were free to board boats at the port of Mariel west of Havana, launching the Mariel Boatlift. The first of 125,000 Cuban refugees from Mariel reached Florida the very next day.


MCAM is as a legacy to all of those who fought for freedom and sought freedom at any cost. This is not solely a Cuban story; it is the quintessential American story of a people who lost their freedom and their dreams and found them once again on the shores of the United

States of America. Our vision is to unite the Cuban Exile story and the American Dream to honor and preserve the gift of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and serve as a beacon of freedom for all who visit.


MCAM is a culturally-specific museum of memory, dedicated to showcasing and documenting the history, culture, and contributions of the Cuban exile community through exhibitions and programming in the arts and the humanities. MCAM tells the story of the Cuban exile, through the eyes of its greatest artists, thinkers, and creators. These artists, born outside or exiled from Cuba, have become some of the most important artists of our time. MCAM is located in the heart of Miami, minutes from Little Havana, and aims to give this story a home away from homeland.

Norman Rockwell

an American painter and illustrator

Norman Rockwell was an American painter and illustrator. His works have a broad popular appeal in the United States for their reflection of American culture. Rockwell is most famous for the cover illustrations of everyday life he created for The Saturday Evening Post magazine over nearly five decades. Norman Rockwell was a prolific artist, producing more than 4,000 original works in his lifetime. Most of his surviving works are in public collections. Rockwell was also commissioned to illustrate more than 40 books, as well as painting the portraits for presidents.

Franklin D. Roosevelt Delivers a Speech

to Congress on the Eve of World War II

The Four Freedoms is a series of four 1943 oil paintings by the American artist Norman Rockwell. The paintings are, Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Want, and Freedom from Fear. They were inspired by Franklin D. Roosevelt’s famous “Four Freedoms” speech delivered to Congress on the eve of World War II. Rockwell’s paintings depicting simple family scenes, illustrating freedoms Americans often take for granted.


The Freedoms were published in a series of four full-color, full-page editions, each accompanied by an essay of the same title. The panels were published in successive weeks in the order corresponding to Roosevelt's speech: Freedom of Speech (February 20), Freedom of Worship (February 27), Freedom from Want (March 6), and Freedom from Fear (March 13).

The Four Freedoms, which were published in a series of Saturday Evening Post issues in 1943, accompanied by short essays from four distinguished writers. The U.S. government subsequently issued posters of Rockwell’s paintings in a highly successful war bond campaign that raised more than $132 million for the war effort. Rockwell’s homey depictions of Roosevelt’s abstract concepts were widely popular across America, yet not everyone was completely in tune with the ideas elaborated in Roosevelt’s speech.


In an editorial published later in 1943, Post editors addressed a controversy over the meaning of the freedoms, in a debate that still has relevance today. Is the dream still alive? As then, we are certainly permitted to hope and aspire to the same ideal today.

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Norman Rockwell’s Four Freedoms

become an american legacy for freedom

Purchase Tickets to the Four Freedoms Exhibit

Norman Rockwell’s Four Freedoms

become an american legacy for freedom

Freedom of Speech

speech image

Freedom of Worship

worship image

Freedom from Want

want image

Freedom from Fear

fear image

Purchase Tickets to the Four Freedoms Exhibit

Help Support the Museum’s Mission to Educate and Inspire Future Generations

to value the virtues of Freedom and the American Dream

The Miami Cuban American Museum (MCAM) is a nonprofit organization founded to honor, preserve and promote the legacy of Cuban Exiles who were welcomed by the United States of America after the Castro Revolution to preserve their democratic values and personal freedoms.

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