Edward Hopper was one of America's great artists who painted scenes highlighting the loneliness and alienation of modern urban life. He was particularly interested in overlooked public spaces like diners, hotel rooms, and gas stations. His most famous painting Night Hawks shows solitary patrons in a late night diner, representing the disconnectedness of city living. Hopper's paintings were meticulously constructed to emphasize bleak, impersonal settings that submerged solitary individuals, reflecting his skepticism about rising urbanization as someone who grew up in rural New York. Though he struggled with recognition early in his career, Hopper eventually became highly acclaimed and was one of the first American artists collected by the Museum of Modern Art.

1. Edward Hopper
A Sense of Urban Alienation
PETER SPEETJENS/ PLASTIK/DEC. 2012
One of America’s all-time great artists, Edward Hopper painted the rise of urban America,
in which the individual has become totally out of place. He had a particular interest for in-
between spaces, places that are easily overlooked, such as diners, hotel rooms and gas
stations.
We see her in passing by. She sits on the side of a bed that almost fills the room, with in one
corner a suitcase and some clothes. She is wearing but an under-gown, yet there is nothing erotic
about the image, as she is prudently reading a book held on her knees. As the title of Edward
Hopper’s 1931 painting suggests Hotel Room is not so much a portrait, but a still life that
happens to feature a human figure.
Due to the emphasis on the room’s cold and functional interior, the work breathes a sense of
loneliness. As the scene is set in a hotel, we may safely assume that the lady reading her book is
as much a passerby, as we are – we, walking through the hallway, throwing a quick glance
inside.
Hopper often painted seemingly anonymous people in seemingly anonymous places, thus
illustrating the rise of modern, urban America. His subjects never feature prominently, but are
submerged within the settings of hotel lobbies and rooms, offices, theaters, restaurants and,
sometimes, private homes.
Rather than portraits, Hopper paints landscapes, in which, despite his realism, the main themes
are such all too human emotions as solitude, boredom and non-communication. Hopper often
said he was merely interested in capturing light.
His most famous work Night Hawks (1942) shows a bar tender and three clients, each on his
own, in a brightly-lit diner late at night. In Automat (1927), a woman, on her own, is staring at
her coffee in an empty fast food restaurant. In Gas (1940), we see a man at a gas station against
the backdrop of a forest. It seems the last outpost of civilization before the wilderness starts.
In Room in New York (1932) we see two people. The man is reading a newspaper, while she has
one finger on the piano. Both look different ways, do separate things – an everyday scene in an
everyday life, together, yet utterly alone in one and the same room.
Just how significant the setting is for Hopper is further illustrated by the paintings’ titles that
nearly all refer to the locations and never to the individual. The latter is but a part of the whole
and, more often than not, seems out of place. While Hopper’s images seem casual, snapshots of
ordinary scenes in ordinary lives and ordinary places, they have been meticulously constructed.
At times, it would take Hopper months before he was satisfied with the exact position of his

2. model – often his wife – and the tiniest details regarding the décor. For example, he made dozens
of sketches of a theater before finally painting New York Movie (1939).
Hopper’s skeptic view on the rise of urban society is perhaps due to him growing up in the leafy,
natural surroundings of upstate New York. Born in 1882 in a relatively well-off family in Nyack,
a small town along the Hudson River, Hopper only moved to New York as an 18-year-old to
study art and design. Perhaps being born in the countryside produced the seed of nostalgia.
Hopper lived a quiet life. He certainly was not the socialite type. Nor did he hang out with other
artists. Most of his adult life, he lived with his wife and fellow artist, Josephine Nivison, in
Greenwich Village.
It took quite some time before Hopper finally received some recognition. For years he struggled
financially and, to survive in the Big Apple, was forced to do illustrations for movies and WWI
propaganda efforts. A major influence in his life was a former teacher who encouraged him to
“to forget about art and do what he pleases” and “it isn’t the subject that counts but what you feel
about it.”
Hopper was in his late 30s when his work finally began to make some waves. He won a few
awards and had three exhibitions, one of which in the Whitney Studio Club, the precursor to the
Whitney Museum. Not a single painting was sold, yet it brought recognition. A few years later
his second solo show was sold out. Interestingly, the first ever oil painting the New York
Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) acquired was a Hopper. MOMA also organized Hopper’s first
retrospectives in 1933.
Ever since, Hopper was able to live more than comfortably of his art and he became known as
one of the all-time great American artists. In 1952, he was asked to represent the US at the
Venice Biennale. He died in his studio on May 15, 1967. His wife followed him 10 months later.
Their joint collection of some 3000 artworks was donated to the Whitney Museum.