Happy Monday, Artsies! Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday weekend. This week’s Masterworks Monday artist is one of my all-time faves, American Realist painter Edward Hopper. A feeling of melancholy tends to pervade most of Hopper’s work, but maybe that is why they appeal to me. His scenes seem so very real, not just in their sense of time and of place, but in the capturing of a moment. Early mornings in small towns DO feel desolate, being an attendant at a gas station on a far off country road WOULD be lonely.
Early Sunday Morning by Edward Hopper
Image via Whitney Museum of American Art
Gas by Edward Hopper
Image via Museum of Modern Art
Don’t you want to know what’s going on with this young blonde movie usher? Is she sad? Is she contemplating making a change in her life?
New York Movie by Edward Hopper
Image via Museum of Modern Art
Despite the lone figures or desolate landscapes, Hopper’s images are filled with light and in that, create a sense of hope within the isolation. Early morning means it is a new day.. light coming in a window means that there is an escape from the darkness. Whether this is what Hopper intended or not, it is what I personally take from his work.
Morning Sun by Edward Hopper
Image via The New York Times
How about you? What do you see in Hopper’s work? How does it make you feel?
whatsnormality
April 25, 2011 at 10:33 AMhmm, his paintinngs do portray a sense of lonliness, don’t they? Especially the last painting in the post, “Morning Sun.” I find myself feeling slightly disturbed and emotional for the girl on the bed, as her facial expression shows some pretty grim feelings that I can’t quite place (is she sad? Hurt? Lonely?) and what is she seeing as she looks out the window? We see part of a building similar to the structure in the first painting, but I wonder if she is gazing out into another empty, lonely area like the subjects of some of his other works. I suppose it’s up to the viewer to determine whether she is seeing something hopefull, or empty.
Lesley
April 25, 2011 at 6:01 PMYou’re right, most of them do portray a feeling of loneliness. But for some reason, “Morning Sun” has always seemed more hopeful to me. Maybe it’s the light or the fact that she is looking out into the light and her expression seems more thoughtful to me than grim. But maybe I am projecting my own optimism on the work?