| Description |
Nighthawks
Edward Hopper 1942
Description of Original: Oil on canvas
Location: Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois
The term "night-hawk", like "night owl," is used figuratively to describe someone who stays up late, and is a name shared with a real family of birds called Nighthawks. The scene was supposedly inspired by a diner (since demolished) in Greenwich Village, Hopper's home neighborhood in Manhattan. The now-vacant lot most usually associated with the former location is known as Mulry Square, at the intersection of Seventh Avenue South, Greenwich Avenue, and West 11th Street.
However, according to The New York Times, this cannot be the location of the diner that inspired the painting, as a gas station was occupying that lot from the 1930s to the 1970s.
Hopper began painting it immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Sunday, December 7, 1941. After this event there was a widespread feeling of gloominess across the country, a feeling that is portrayed in the painting. The urban street is empty outside the diner, and inside none of the three patrons are apparently looking at or talking to the others; all are lost in their own thoughts. Two are a couple, while the third is a man sitting alone, with his back to the viewer. The diner's sole attendant, looking up from his work, appears to be peering out the window past the customers. |
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