''Early Sunday Morning'' is a 1930 oil painting by American artist
Edward Hopper
Edward Hopper (July 22, 1882 – May 15, 1967) was an American realism painter and printmaker. He is one of America's most renowned artists and known for his skill in depicting modern American life and landscapes.
Born in Nyack, New York, to a ...
.
Description
The painting portrays the small businesses and shops of
Seventh Avenue in New York City shortly after sunrise. It shows a cloudless sky over a long, red building. A red and blue striped barber pole sits in front of one of the doorways on the right side of the sidewalk, and a green fire hydrant is on the left. The bleak, empty street and storefronts are said to be a representation of the dire state of the city during the
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
.
Despite the title, Hopper has said that the painting was not necessarily based on a Sunday view. The painting was originally titled ''Seventh Avenue Shops''. The addition of "Sunday" to the title was "tacked on by someone else".
The image was based on a building nearby Hopper's studio. It is said to be "almost a literal translation of Seventh Avenue"; however, a few minor details were changed, like decreasing the size of the doorways and making the lettering on the storefronts less clear.
Provenance
It is currently in the collection of the
Whitney Museum of American Art
The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is a Modern art, modern and Contemporary art, contemporary American art museum located in the Meatpacking District, Manhattan, Meatpacking District and West Village neighbor ...
.
The piece was originally sold to the Whitney for $2,000. It was purchased with funds from Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney just a few months after it was painted, and would go on to become a part of the Whitney's founding collection.
Critical response
Scholar
Karal Ann Marling notes that Edward Hopper's work "is a prelude to the wakeful coffee urns and to those who tend them to defeat the night". According to the American
art critic
An art critic is a person who is specialized in analyzing, interpreting, and evaluating art. Their written critiques or reviews contribute to art criticism and they are published in newspapers, magazines, books, exhibition brochures, and catalogue ...
Blake Gopnik
Blake Gopnik (born 1963) is an American art critic who has lived in New York City since 2011. He previously spent a decade as chief art critic of ''The Washington Post'', prior to which he was an arts editor and critic in Canada. He has a docto ...
, "The painting’s bone-deep
conservatism
Conservatism is a Philosophy of culture, cultural, Social philosophy, social, and political philosophy and ideology that seeks to promote and preserve traditional institutions, Convention (norm), customs, and Value (ethics and social science ...
, and its obvious, almost polemical resistance to the most ambitious European art of its day. In the midst of the depression in America, that conservatism is as much a part of the painting’s subject as the closed shops it depicts."
The painting has become the inspiration for other works of art. Examples include Byron Vazakas' poem ''Early Sunday Morning'' and John Stone's poem of the same name.
See also
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List of works by Edward Hopper
The following is an incomplete list of works by American painter Edward Hopper.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hopper, Edward
Edward Hopper, works
Lists of works of art ...
References
External links
Whitney.org
{{DEFAULTSORT:Early Sunday Morning
Paintings by Edward Hopper
1930 paintings
Paintings in the Whitney Museum of American Art