Status Updates From Hopper

Hotel Window, 1959 (private)

Gray haired woman, red dress & cape on blue couch looking out to dark street

Hotel Window it turns out is another instance of Hopper’s favorite shape, the trapezoid, creating not only a formal imperative w/in the painting, but a fateful one, as well.

New York Movie, 1939 (MoMA NY)

On one side… stands an usherette absorbed in thought. On the other, a scattering of barely visible moviegoers…The sides are separated by a heavy vertical—the end of the wall & an engaged column…

Instead of watching a drama of what geometry wills& what narrative proposes, as we do in other Hoppers, we experience the two working together.

Automat, 1927 (Des Moines Art Center)

…a woman, near a door & in front of a plate glass window, sits alone at a round table.

Chair Car, 1965

…a progression of yellow blocks of light on the train car floor, flanked by windows & chairs, leads to the end of the car…

It is a fairly consostent pattern in Hopper that a pictorial geometry should demand an action contrary to what the narrative wills.

Cape Cod Morning, 1950

The object of her attention, like the source of the light, is b/y the picture. We can only witness its effects… In Hopper it seems there is always sthg “beyond” that works its influence on those w/in the picture.

Nighthawks, 1940, Art Inst

There is nothing menacing about it, nothing that suggests danger is waiting around the corner…It is as if the light were a cleansing agent, nowhere are there signs of urban filth. The city, as in most H’s, asserts itself formally rather than realistically…The diner is an island of light distracting whoever might be walking by…trapezoid pull of pntg to left v a light place to stay

Gas, 1940, MoMA

…the shadowy woods seem poised, ready to absorb the viewer as well as (any travelers)…(But) It is the station..that gathers our attention. It forms a corridor that leaves us little doubt where we—travelers & viewers alike—are headed. The illuminated sign…w/its small red winged horse only underscores w/ironic detachment, the impossibility of escaping what seems like our mortal destiny.

People in the Sun, 1960, Natl Am Art

…a mixture of the comic & forlorn…But are they there to get sun? If they are, why are they dressed for work, or as if in a doctor’s waiting room?…And what are we to make of the young man reading, who sits b/h the file of four? He appears to be more absorbed in culture than nature, yet he is out there w/the others…looking ahead…into a wide field extends to row of hills

In H’s pntgs there is a lot of waiting going on. H’s ppl seem to have nothing to do. They are like characters whose parts have deserted them & now, trapped in the space of their waiting, must keep themselves company, w/no clear place to go, no future.

H’s pntgs are short, isolated moments of figuration that suggest the tone of what will follow just as they carry forward the tone of what proceeded them. The tone but not the content. The implication but not the evidence. They are saturated w/suggestion. The more theatrical or staged they are, the more they urge us to wonder what will happen next; the more lifelike…urge us to construct narrative of what came b/f

Cape Cod Evening, 1939, Natl Gallery

In C.C.E… the use of the triangle is more subtle in its narrative implications. Instead of being an instance of geometric insularity & safety set against the virtual emptiness of a deep space, it’s is a fragile & momentary arrangement of 3 figures set against the powerful claims of the familiar trapezoid… woman watches husband, man coaxing dog, dog gazing off canvas to left

Ground Swell, 1939, Corcoran (cont.)

But the triangle made by the boat & the buoy is the one that counts. It what makes this picture so static…The boat & buoy are locked together, immobilized by the figure they form. In addition, the ppl on deck, by staring @ the buoy, lock it in place. Their attention…is concentrated on bridging the gap…an equilibrium has been reached b/t depiction of passage…& stillness.

Ground Swell, 1939, Corcoran

In some H’s a refusal of the problematics of travel is attempted…(Ground Swell) depicts a scene of unusual serenity. The sea has the undulant solidity of a rolling landscape & the boat seems virtually motionless…Two triangles intersect…cancelling or stalling the motion of the other: the sail to the buoy to the gaff along the top of the sail, & the cirrus clouds in a giant V…

Early Sunday Morning, 1930, Whitney (cont.)

A dreamy collaboration of stillness & quiet makes it seem that some magical moment is being extended, and that we are its privileged witnesses.

Early Sunday Morning, 1930, Whitney

The powerful horizontal thrust of curb, first- & second-story divider & rooftop makes us feel that the street & bldg extend well b/y the pntg’s purview…There is no actual or implied progression in the shaded or open windows, none in the doorways or storefronts. Here, as in all other H’s, the city is idealized. The ppl are asleep. There is no traffic.

House by the Railroad, 1925, MoMA

The familiar isosceles trapezoid is @ work…formed by the tracks @ the base & the cornice of the house @ the top, it suggests movement to the left…(But) the mvmt is counteracted by the strong verticality of the house, its stability & centrality. The house resists this pull…

One of the reasons H’s light is so wedded to objects is that his pntgs were, by his own admission, put together from notes & memory… To capture light…one must go outside & paint, which H did not do when he worked in oil. Actual light changes too quickly for a man who worked as slowly as H did… His pntgs are careful & scrupulously considered rather than improvisational & their light has a memorial…character