In what is proving to be a super stellar start to the Fall art season (keep your eyes peeled for our coverage from everything from Wild Style to Ian Whitmore to Chuck Close from this weekend), as of this past Saturday, National Gallery of Art is proudly hosting the first comprehensive survey of Edward Hopper’s career to be seen in American museums outside New York in more than 25 years.
Start feeling special now.
Considered by many to be the quintessential realist painter of twentieth-century America, Hopper’s paintings convey a mood of loneliness and desolation of large cities by their emptiness or by the presence of anonymous, non-communicating figures. He painted American landscapes and cityscapes with a disturbing truth, expressing the world around him as a chilling, alienating, and often vacuous place. Everone Hopper’s paintings appears terribly alone, which may hit a little too close to home for some of us/you/everyone we know these days but was something new in art when it first appeared during the Great Depression of the 1930s.So, don’t forget your xanax en route to the Gallery this month.
from the press kit:
This exhibition of about 48 oil paintings, 34 watercolors, and 12 prints will reveal Hopper (1882–1967) as a creator of compelling images who produced remarkably subtle and painterly effects in both oil and watercolor.
Also, as a special treat shown in conjunction with the show:
Edward Hopper Film
Narrated by actor and art collector Steve Martin, this film traces Hopper’s varied influences, from French impressionism to the gangster films of the 1930s. The documentary uses archival photographs and film, new footage of locations painted by Hopper in New York and along the New England coast, and interviews with artists Eric Fischl and Red Grooms, scholars, and curators. A short version will be shown continuously in the exhibition.
East Building Small Auditorium
Monday–Friday, noon–3:00 p.m.
Weekends, 1:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m.
East Building Auditorium
Tuesdays and Wednesdays, 11:00 a.m.
for more details go to:
http://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/hopperinfo.shtm
are we trying to say illustration is not art?
September 17, 2007 at 2:34 pmyeah dude i dont think anyone would consider him an illustrator…and he is my favorite ARTIST ever!
September 17, 2007 at 5:57 pmDear Svet,
I love the use of the editorial “we.”
-Jason
September 18, 2007 at 12:27 pmWhat’s up with this retarded youtube movie you posted here? That wasn’t the film shown in the exhibit?…..
September 18, 2007 at 12:41 pmits not. i should have clarified that.
i just figured it worked as sort of a nice pseudo slide show as opposed to having 800 images in this post.
Great little movie as an introduction to Hopper’s life and work. Pity about the goonstar poster, probably more of a goon and twat than he realises.
September 23, 2007 at 3:24 pmI agree with the above poster, what kind of Hopper admirerer would go and say that a film about his life is retarded. I’m looking forward to the exhibition, just hope I don’t have the misfortune to bump into a goonstar! What a retard!
September 23, 2007 at 3:28 pmWhat is a “pseudo slide show”? clarify if you can please.
Can it be used in the same context as saying that this is a “pseudo website”?
It’s a video in the form of a slide show with moving images interspersed, which would make it not quite a standard issue slide show by definition, and therefore a “pseudo slide show” is an appropriate an obvious description. Pseudo douche-bag anyone? Nope, you’re the real McCoy!
September 23, 2007 at 7:35 pmHa ha ha, its the same twat that calls themself the film critic, or is that pseudo film critic, thats a blog in the form of a film review with faux-ironic comments interspersed throughout. I’ve always wondered who is the Ed Wood of film critics, and now I know, or is that pseudo film critic…whatever dude, like totally go invade another country…like how awesome would that be right there…like totally real McCoy. I doubt if there is something real in your entire country…I’m sorry did I say “your country”, I meant to say the Native American’s country, that is before you went and like totally killed them in a real awesome way, not a pseudo way.
September 24, 2007 at 5:55 amThats a nice pseudo history lesson Hopperfan, actually we didn’t kill all the native americans, only enough so we could take over their country. Hopefully like we will do in Iraq.
September 24, 2007 at 12:59 pmI read something interesting the other day about the trail of tears - that the Cherokee tribe wasn’t rounded up out of their teepees and what not all savage-like screaming with their tomahawks (kidding, but you know what I mean) but many had actually westernized their culture to a point where they had even built a public school system and had adopted western clothing and religion, etc. Just makes the cruelty of the forced relocation and deaths of 4,000 native Americans even more atrocious in my mind (if that is possible), as they saw that these were indeed human beings and not the assumed godless savages which could have at least been used as an excuse (an unacceptable excuse, but again, you know what I mean).
September 24, 2007 at 1:19 pmI really loathe the impractically liberal British people. Not all British people, not British music or art or men’s fashion (hat tip to District Line!). Just those sort of people who for some reason have taken an overly active interest in this site. Maybe they’re not British but certainly sound like it. BYT has nothing to do with war or native Americans (I am half-Cherokee, actually, so I can officially vouch for that). So long!
September 24, 2007 at 1:33 pmDude, don’t be so naive. It is our tax payers dollars that goes toward building the bombs that kill people, and most Americans do absolutely nothing about it but maintain the status quo of cruelty that our country inflicts on other nations. I think it is the “impractically liberal British people” that should be telling us whats wrong with our country, because we are so isolated that we don’t have the critical distance to reflect on our terrible ways. Don’t think that it has nothing to do wit you, it has everything to do with you. Innocent women and children are being killed so you can maintain a website like this. Ask yourself, do you think many 20 somethings in Iraq are able to maintain such a website and have underwear parties to post on it.
Take responsibility and get active. http://www.iraqwar.org/
when did BYT comments get so politically-charged?
seriously, this is worse than: swingoutdc.com/forum
i went to Oberlin
so if i think this is extreme, that says something
crazy comment people: you’re more entertaining than you are useful, get some money and go buy a clue
September 24, 2007 at 2:33 pmMy fears have been confirmed, according to the above poster, if a person is concerned about innocent women and children being killed, then they are “crazy” and “extreme”, and the outcome of this thinking of mine is that I should “go buy a clue” and that my thoughts are nothing more than “entertaining” rather than “useful”. Do you want to take a minute to see what you are saying.
Excuse me for trying to get people involved in seeking justice and peace for innocent and helpless people, but if that makes me “crazy” well then so be it.
then try being politically astute and constructive with your message instead of embracing your current lack of finesse and relevance
maybe then you’ll actually have a positive impact
and no, you’re not excused
stay afraid, fearful
sorry y’all, this is just too easy
like fish in a barrel
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The White House will ask Congress next week to approve another massive spending measure for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan totaling nearly 200 billion dollars, The Los Angeles Times reported on its website late Saturday.
Citing unnamed Pentagon officials, the newspaper said if President George W. Bush’s spending request is approved, 2008 will be the most expensive year of the Iraq war.
US war costs have continued to grow because of the additional combat forces sent to Iraq this year and because of efforts to quickly ramp up production of new equipment, such as mine-resistant trucks, the report said.
The new trucks can cost three to six times as much as an armored Humvee, according to the paper.
The Bush administration said earlier this year that it probably would need 147.5 billion dollars for fiscal 2008, but Pentagon officials now say that and 47 billion dollars more will be required, The Times said.
That would spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan at about 195 billion in fiscal 2008, which begins in October 1, an increase of around 12 percent from the 173 billion dollars spent this year.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and other officials are to formally present the full request at a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing Wednesday, the report said.
When costs of CIA operations and embassy expenses are added, the war in Iraq currently costs taxpayers about 12 billion dollars a month, said Winslow Wheeler, a former Republican congressional budget aide who is a senior fellow at the Center for Defense Information in Washington.
“Everybody predicts declines, but they haven’t occurred, and 2008 will be higher than 2007,” the paper quotes Wheeler as saying. “It all depends on what happens in Iraq, but thus far it has continued to get bloodier and more expensive.”
In 2004, the two conflicts together cost 94 billion dollars; in 2005, they cost 108 billion; in 2006, 122 billion, the paper said.
The new spending request is likely to push the cumulative cost of the war in Iraq alone through 2008 past the 600-billion-dollar mark — more than the Korean War and nearly as much as the Vietnam War, based on estimates by government budget officials, The Times said.
That is tax payers money, which you contribute to.
That “relevant” enough for you.
I thought Iraq Underwear Party IV was ok, the DJ’s could have been better though.
Okay I will try to be constructive, why did the majority of the citizens of the US vote back in a president that was responsible for the war in Iraq?
I am not from the US and this question is not trying to be rhetorical, I actually don’t know why he was voted back in, and it would be helpful to my understanding of the situation if anyone had any ideas about why he got a second term in office after all the negative things he had done?
That guy in the green gloves is my next door neighbour!
September 24, 2007 at 4:02 pmHopper would not have approved of any of these shenanigans. And Jason who considers Hopper merely an ‘illustrator’ should re-examine the artist’s entire body of work. His commercial and fine art work are distinct and separate. There is no denying he is an Artist with a capital A.
Or perhaps he has mistaken the recontextualization of his work (i.e. Nighthawks at Diner reworked with images of James Dean, Marilyn Monroe & Humphrey Bogart and sold at mall ‘poster art’ stores) as legitimate scholarly interpretation…
September 24, 2007 at 4:13 pmAmen.
September 24, 2007 at 4:15 pm
He was more illustrator than artist, but I still think his work is fantastic.
September 17, 2007 at 2:34 pm