"The only real influence I've ever had was myself."
- Edward Hopper
COVER
Hopper is a puzzle. Has been from the start. While he seems to tolerate the label: realist. He does so with proviso. Definitely not a painter of the "American Scene." And no realist in the Norman Rockwell sense. Declares Botticelli's "Birth of Venus" a mere "pretty...picture." And stands steadfast against American expressionists, such as Jackson Pollock. In contrast to them, as inventors of "arbitrary forms."
When pressed, Hopper insists he does not paint American scenes (from which his works clearly are drawn). Rather he expresses his own emotional response to them. Asked what he was after, in his painting "Sun in an Empty Room." Simple answer, "I'm after me."
Five years of personal research assures the reader a thoughtful database of artist's-eye observations. Respectful treatment of Hopper's legacy in works and words and personal behavior. A careful integration of all three leads to the shocking categorical conclusion. In his art, Edward Hopper, American Realist, is neither. Not American, not Realist.
That difference is Hopper's dramatic content. The presentation of a radically new, artist's-eye view of the life and works of an artist popular as an American Realist. Enacted in the drama-set figure: "Hopper's Allegory." As documented scene-by-scene, frame-by-frame. Overarching.
PRECIS
The Love of his life descending into her self-induced destitution. Her attempt to rise, only to tease, to falter, to fall again still harder. The agony of his stepping aside, allowing her human, monetary, tradition-tragedy to unfold. For him to anticipate rejection at the outset of her manufactured destiny.
How all somehow almost works out. The compromise of life, dealt with finally. That West that never was. Denial aside. Distinctive Hopper integrity at work. Mutual resignation to a participated fate. Choice is: to be. Of history, ever wary.
REVIEW
At last I have cleared my mind to attend to your remarkable piece of writing. Firstly congratulations. It is an insightful and contextually rich piece of work. You write with passion and understanding.
On the one hand it reads so well and with such poetic elements that I almost think of it as a basis for a script to be read by an actor. It certainly reads very well when read aloud. It could also be a well-crafted paper to be given at something like the College Art Association annual talk fest in New York.
Because it is such a visual piece, the images large on a screen in the traditionally darkened lecture hall, with the author somewhat demonically lit, to one side extracting things from a huge colour reproduction of "Gas" or "Nighthawks" would be very dramatic.
The footnotes are supportive, references wide-ranging and erudite, so perhaps it would be seen as a breath of fresh air.
However, art historians would, in all probability curl up their lips distastefully at what they'd see as the lack of documentary evidence. Well my generation of Courtauld students would.
But my guru and lecturer, Gombrich would not. He'd have enjoyed it, I'm sure. Especially as he was at work at Bletchley decoding German intercepts for MI6 at the time of the "Gas" and "Nighthawks" painting! But the stuffy ones would say, "Where are the Hopper diary entries or letters?" I would of course say, "So?"
Which is why I felt that all too often critics and especially academics attend to context, social history and of course documents and provenance. But never actually attend to or just visually consume the work. This of course is what practicing artists do.
I make these comments as my response to one of the most enjoyable pieces of art interpretive writing which I have read recently. Once read it colours all future thoughts on those two iconic Hoppers.
Neville Weston, PhD
Wales, UK
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