Volume 17, Number 10 · December 16, 1971
Hopper's Theater
By Bryan Robertson
Edward Hopper
by Lloyd Goodrich
Abrams, 308 pp., $50.00
Three long, thin bands of cloud stretch out in soft gray-purple against a luminous sunset: the deep pink and gold sky dominates everything for the land beneath is gently rolling, inclined to flatness with a low horizon line, and filled with intense shadows cast by that penultimate moment of sunset when even grass turns a livid and somber color. Fading light glints on a metal railroad track cleaving its way across the empty landscape. There are no trees or signs of human activity. In this bleak stillness, the only opposition to the wide horizontal lines of railroad track, horizon, and distant cloud is the gaunt, vertical structure of a signal box rearing up, with its top story etched sharp against the hectic sky, its base merging into the shadowed bank of the landscape. Close by the signal box, in the foreground, is a short post lost in the gathering dusk; on the far side of the track, a tall pole cuts the sky with its signal plaques down. The scene is richly mournful, and ominous: that wild sunset is about to lose its brilliance at any second, the light will soon depart and you, the onlooker, will be alone.
Review, 2981 words
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