Hopper - "Shacks at Lanesville" Realistic watercolor painting of shacks and a road in the Lanesville section of Gloucester, Maine.

Edward Hopper • American (1882-1967)

Shacks at Lanesville C: 1923 • Watercolor on Paper 14" x 20"

“Great art is the outward expression of an inner life (of) the artist.”
Edward Hopper

Somewhere in New York City there is always a crowd and a spectacle, no matter the time of day or night. Yet when one young artist painted the city in his most famous work there were a few lonely people sitting at a well-lit counter in an empty diner. They were surrounded by empty streets and vacant buildings. Welcome to the world of Edward Hopper as seen through one of the most famous works of modern American realism, his painting, Nighthawks.

Consider what happens when a conservative young man with an amazing talent for observation bumps into an art world busy dismantling reality into abstract shapes. Edward Hopper’s reaction to the Fauvists, Cubists, and Expressionists of his day was to ignore them and pursue his individual vision of modern life. Yet, perhaps no modern artist has expressed the isolation of the industrial age with more soul and insight than Edward Hopper.

Hopper was, perhaps, the most famous American realist, not because he painted houses, landscapes and people the way everyone saw them, but because he painted things the way he saw them. And, he saw life through the lens of an awkward young boy who revered the famous writer Ralph Waldo Emerson and his philosophy of life focused on the individual.

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“Shacks at Lanesville” shows how Hopper used reality to make a statement. He could have painted the flourishing creative community that flocked to the Lanesville section of Gloucester in the 1920’s and 30’s, drawn by the natural beauty and inexpensive granite from abandoned mines. But, rather, he painted a remote section of shacks without people, symbolic of a town whose fishing industry had already died, and whose granite industry was in its last days.

Hopper was a prolific painter who saw cities late at night with abandoned streets. Houses alone without neighbors. He saw sailboats alone against the fierce sea and people lost in their loneliness who never look straight at the painter.

Some call his vision bleak. But perhaps beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Canton Museum of Art Permanent Collection • The James C. & Barbara J. Koppe Collection, 2000.7

4 Ways to Sound Smart When Viewing at The Canton Museum of Art

1.
“Although often grouped with American Scene Painters like Norman Rockwell and Grant Wood, Hopper felt they caricatured America while he ‘always wanted to do myself.’”

2.
“When Hopper wanted to paint a Burlesque House, he enlisted his wife, Jo, to model as the stripper in ‘Girlie Show’.”

3.
“You might not guess by looking at this picture, but Lanesville was a well-known artists community by the time Hopper did this painting.”

4.
“You know, Tom Waits once wrote an entire album named ‘Nighthawks at the Diner’ based on Hopper’s famous painting.”

Hopper Timeline. Scroll over images to see timeline.

1882

Born in Upper Nyack, New York, to Elizabeth Griffiths Smith and her husband Garret Henty Hopper, a dry-goods merchant. The family was well-to-do with a considerable inheritance from his mother. Edward had one sister, Marion.

1899

Began art studies with a correspondence course, but soon transferred to the New York School of Art and Design, now known as Parsons The New School for Design. His parents insisted he study commercial art so that he could make a living. Among his teachers were William Merritt Chase and Robert Henri who told his students “It isn’t the subject that counts, but what you feel about it.”

1905

Began working for a New York advertising agency as an illustrator for trade magazine covers. He hated it, however his earnings allowed him to visit Europe. Especially Paris, where he painted street scenes and viewed the city’s art treasures.

1913

Hopper sold his first painting, Sailing, at the famous Armory Show in New York City. This show exposed America to the Modern Art movement popular in Europe. He moved to Washington Square in Greenwich Village where he would live for the rest of his life.

1915

For a short time, due to a creative block in his oil painting, Hopper turned to etching producing approximately 70 urban scenes of Paris and New York. He also produced posters for the war effort.

1918

Awarded the U.S. Shipping Board Prize for his war poster “Smash the Hun.” In subsequent years he received other awards for his etchings.

1924

Married Josephine Nivison, another artist and former student of Robert Henri. Although gregarious by nature, Jo shared a reclusive life with her husband who she remarked about: “sometimes talking to Eddie is just like dropping a stone in a well, except that it doesn’t thump when it hits bottom.” She managed his career.

1925

The Hopper’s became financially secure as Edward’s art met critical acclaim. He sold out his first one-man show and museums began to collect his work.

1931

His career continued to rise as both the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art paid thousands of dollars for his paintings.

1933

Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) gave him his first large-scale retrospective show.

1942

Painted Nighthawks, perhaps his most well known work. It took an outsiders look into the windows of a New York diner where three lonely patrons (modeled on his wife and himself) were seated at the well-lit counter.

1967

Hopper died in his studio near Washington Square. Josephine died ten months later. Their joint collection of over 3,000 works was bequeathed to the Whitney Museum of American Art.

2004

A collection of Hopper’s paintings toured Europe, with one stop being the Tate Modern in London. There the exhibit was the second most popular in the museum’s history with over 420,000 visitors during its three month run.