Abstracting Hopper

Abstract

One of the most seductive aspects of Hopper paintings is the sheer visual potency of their painted surface, the lavish formal trap of line and color that the artist has composed. Parts of a Hopper canvas can thus be seen to have a life of their own, a life abstracted from the Hopperesque. The aim of this paper is to tease out, isolate and analyze this other, abstract Hopper and to pay dues to it. Our thought experiment seeks to give the abstraction in Hopper its due beside the imagery— beside, or rather inside. For, like a Trojan horse, Hopper’s gifted storytelling is ushered into our imagination and his pictorial chromatics then conquer us from within. What wins out in the end is the abstractive logic of Hopper’s persistent phototropism.