Nova York - Estados Unidos
Coleção privada
OST - 81x96 - 1929
Chop Suey (1929)
is a painting by Edward
Hopper. The foreground of the work portrays two women in
conversation at a restaurant. In November 2018, it was sold at a record price
for the artist's work.
The scene depicts
two women at a table in a restaurant with another couple in the background. The
only features being shown in particular detail are the painted woman’s face,
the coat hanging above her, her companion’s back [to the viewer], the features
of the couple in the background, the tea pot on the table, the masked lower
window panel, and the restaurant sign outside. These are all features that
would bring a sensory element (besides sight) to the memory painted. The
buzzing noise of the outside light, the voices of the people in the background,
the texture of the coat, the taste of the tea and smell of the cigarette smoke
(held by the man) and the muddled light from the masked window.
Edward
Hopper’s artwork is known for its realistic scenes that touch themes of
isolation and self-being rather than a narrative context. He often described
his art as a “transcription [of his] most intimate impressions of nature”
meaning he related the process of painting to that of memory. This idea
could further be described in another way as when, for example, you draw
something from a personal memory, certain details can be remembered but
everything outside the primary focus is blank background. Chop Suey captures
this concept of memory, making the viewer focus on particular elements of
sensory iconography whilst depicting a theme of isolation due to self being.
According to
art scholar David Anfam, one "striking detail of Chop Suey is
that its female subject faces her doppelgänger." Others
have pointed out it would not be so unusual for two women to be wearing similar
hats, and that it is presumptuous to claim doppelgängers when one subject's
face is not visible to the viewer. The painting has an interior subject
matter, being inside of a cafe, and does not focus on any one given figure. As with
many of Hopper's works, the painting features close attention to the effects of
light on his subjects.
By detailing
only the sensory iconography, the painting takes a step back from pure realism,
as if by painting the complete memory you are also destroying the fine details
that make it actively realistic. Rolf G. Renner, author of “Hopper” states
that, “…part of what [Hopper’s] pictures are ‘about’ is that death or decay
which all paintings in some sense represent, since they destroy the immediacy of
perception through the transformation into an image”.
Although the
scene of the painting takes place in a social environment there is the sense of
loneliness prevalent. The woman in green facing the viewer is sitting with her
companion but she does not seem to be interacting with her. As with the couple
in the background, the man looks withdrawn from the woman he sits across from.
Every human figure is isolated and withdrawn from one another and reserved
within themselves. This is portrayed with hidden or obscured faces, retracting
a human essence from the figures. This further applies to the woman in detail;
even though we get a full view of her face there is a detachment to her because
of her stark makeup.
The alabaster
skin with the bold rouge and painted lip suggest only the impression of a
woman, similar to a doll, it only suggests the appearance of a girl. Normally
in context with the style of the era (late 1920s), this could be taken as a
trendy and lively style, “the women's tight-fitting sweaters, cloche hats, and
made-up faces, which in a previous era would have marked them as sexually
available, had become mainstream”. But Hopper negates that by making the
woman’s face the same value of white as other blank features in the background,
thus hollowing-out her human essence. The viewer interprets her to be “spacing
out”or listening un-intently rather than making eye contact and interacting
with the viewer, as if she is not focused on her surroundings.
The composition
of Chop Suey further encompasses Hopper’s concept memory as opposed to complete
realism. The balance is held across the middle section of the painting with
there being more un-detailed areas just above the eye line of sight, these
areas are marked with rougher brush marks. The negative/ un-detalied space in
the background further add to this because the eye simply passes over them and
focuses more on the details presented. These spaces are simple because they are
the background features that were not committed to memory. There is “weight”
held in the presence of details contained between the figures at the tables all
the way to the details in the design of the sign outside, the hanging jacket
and the lower window covering. This gives the effect of the viewer seeing the
scene and all the important aspects, ignoring the exterior context. This is
described in an article by USA
Today Magazine: “The brief interruption in action, the mask-like
face of the protagonist, and the abstract geometries in the windows contribute
to the sense that the unfolding narrative is not about these specific actions
or this place, but rather about a modern state of being”.
With this in
mind the viewer can assume the narrative behind this particular memory. In a
bibliography by Gail Levin, the location of Chop Suey is described, “…the
setting recalled the inexpensive, second floor Chinese restaurant the Hoppers
had been frequenting in Columbus Circle”. This might explain the primary focus
on the woman (possibly his wife, Jo) and the dullness of the surroundings. If
it was a place Edward Hopper had frequently visited then there would be no reason
to concentrate on the surroundings, but rather the moment of the scene.
Barney
A. Ebsworth owned the painting and had promised it to the Seattle
Art Museum. However, at his death, ownership transferred to his
estate. In November of 2018, the painting sold for $92 million, a new record
for a work by the artist.
As art
historian Robert Hobbs has written, American painter Edward Hopper (1882-1967)
was concerned above all ‘with general human values’, using art ‘as a way to
frame the forces at work in the modern world’. Chop Suey (1929), the most iconic painting by
Hopper left in private hands, epitomises the psychological complexity for which
his work is celebrated, freezing in place an everyday scene from an America
that was changing rapidly.
In his early
years Hopper studied painting at the New York School of Art under Robert Henri, the leader of
the Ashcan School,
which emphasised a gritty realism. Although his style would transform over
time, Hopper never abandoned Henri’s central teaching: to paint the city and
street life he knew best. While some of his contemporaries focused on the
flamboyant flapper set, Hopper trained his eye on the quieter, quotidian dramas
unfolding in unpretentious places such as Chinese restaurants, automats and
diners.
Derived from
the Cantonese phrase tsap sui,
meaning ‘odds and ends’, chop suey restaurants had by the mid-1920s evolved
into popular luncheonettes where the new working class could grab a bite to
eat. Hopper’s oil paintings were often a result of a combination of his
past experiences, and it is thought that Chop Suey was partially inspired by two restaurants
the artist visited in the 1920s.
The Far East
Tea Garden, located at 8 Columbus Circle on New York City’s Upper West Side,
was a second-floor spot that Hopper and his wife Josephine frequented in the
early years of their marriage. The Empire Chop
Suey in Portland, Maine, where the Hoppers spent the summer of 1927,
boasted a similarly striking sign — 24ft high and weighing 600 pounds —
to the one that features so prominently in the painting. Neither establishment
still exists.
In Chop Suey, two women sit at a
table, with another couple partially visible in the background. The bright
white tables are conspicuously empty, with only the Asian teapot on the near
table suggesting any Chinese influence. Art historian Judith A. Barter has
explained that this is characteristic of Hopper’s style: ‘There is never
anything to eat on Hopper’s tables. Famously uninterested in food, Hopper and
his wife often made dinner from canned ingredients. What he found important
were the spaces where eating and drinking took place.’
Hopper’s
restaurant paintings reflect the shifting role and view of American women in
the late 1920s. Chop suey joints were spaces where the new female workforce was
welcome — indeed, the woman facing the viewer is the painting’s focal point.
But rather than basking in the light streaming in from the restaurant window,
she appears pensive, avoiding eye contact with either the viewer or her
companion.
Posed for by
Josephine Hopper — as were all three female figures in the scene — she seems
removed from the woman sitting just across from her. This sense of distance is
heightened by Hopper’s practice of using light almost as a theatre spotlight,
contributing an unsettling sense of solitude.
‘In New York’s
restaurants, women, especially young ones, were on public display as never
before,’ explains Patti Junker, curator of American art at the Seattle Art Museum. ‘Hopper’s restaurant
pictures all focus on these young working-class women, and thus they understand
something essential about the character of the modern city in which he painted.
They reveal, too, the social and sexual tensions that came with new public
roles for men and women. Hopper’s New York café women of the 1920s are among
his most psychologically and sexually charged character studies.’
Hopper plays
as much with colour and light as he does with mood. In the background, swathes
of cool blues are bisected by bands of strong white light, casting a
near-abstract pattern on the walls. The warm hues in the foreground, meanwhile,
draws attention to the striking red, white and blue of the gleaming sign
outside.
It was perhaps
this play of light and form that so attracted Abstract Expressionist Mark Rothko, who was
inspired by Chop Suey
in his early career. In incorporating the bold signage of the city
streets, Chop Suey
also foreshadows Pop Art, with Hopper’s exploration of the commoditisation of
dining in the 1920s anticipating the themes of Pop Art a half-century later.
Fonte: https://www.christies.com/lotfinder/paintings/edward-hopper-chop-suey-6168966-details.aspx?from=salesummery&intobjectid=6168966&sid=13db3ac9-0f91-47e8-be3e-71dd7d0e8d95
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