Hopper

We went to the Edward Hopper exhibit today, as is our annual rite this time of year to go and enjoy art at a museum.  The most recognized piece of his is "Nighthawks".  Pretty amazing up close.

Even as an architect I don't get to enjoy art for its sake as much as I would like.  In fact, whenever I hit a particular exhibit it seems like that part of my brain is a stiff dried up sponge, only to be replenished by these too infrequent visits.

A couple of things, though, about viewing art in a museum.  I get tired really quickly (the weary type) and my lower back begins to ache as if I rode two cyclocross races back to back.  All of that standing and pondering.

The actual visit elicits  very specific thoughts that distinctly burn into my memory.  This particular exhibit made me think of the following:

Just how dedicated my grandfather was in his own efforts to reproduce street scenes of Braddock PA in the '60's and '70's.  His style was amazingly similar to Hopper's.  I don't know if he knew it, but Hopper's art may have been so pervasive so as to influence his.

The rooftops of New York immediately brought to mind that scene in Godfather II where Vito Corleone, after killing Mr. "I just wanna wet my beak" (I forgot his name--Don something), busts up his gun and all evidence of the crime and stuffs the pieces down the various vent stacks on the roof as he begins his trek home over the rooftop landscape to rejoin his family.

Just how ordinary the scenes that he painted were, though he was able to infuse them with a sense of foreboding spookiness, even sinister.

Go see it.