Sunlight in a Cafeteria Artist: Edward Hopper (American, 1882–1967)

1958

American Paintings and Sculpture

On view, 3rd floor, Modern and Contemporary Art and Design


From the time he was a young man, Edward Hopper was intrigued by people in urban restaurants, where strangers had little interaction. Sunlight in a Cafeteria captures an unsettling tension between the man and woman who are clearly aware of, but do not acknowledge, each other’s presence. This edgy stillness suggests the closed lines of communication in much of modern urban life. As in so many of Hopper’s paintings, the ambiguity in the scene opens up multiple narrative possibilities.

Medium

Oil on canvas

Dimensions

40 3/16 × 60 1/8 in. (102.1 × 152.7 cm)

Credit Line

Bequest of Stephen Carlton Clark, B.A. 1903

Accession Number

1961.18.31

Geography

Made in United States

Culture

American

Period

20th century

Classification

Paintings

Disclaimer

Note: This electronic record was created from historic documentation that does not necessarily reflect the Yale University Art Gallery’s complete or current knowledge about the object. Review and updating of records is ongoing.

Provenance
Stephen Carlton Clark, b.a. 1903, about 1958 to 1961; Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Conn.
Bibliography
  • Lisa R. Brody et al., "To Varnish or Not to Varnish?," Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin (2010): 124–25, fig. 3–5.
  • Patricia Junker, Edward Hopper Women, exh. cat. (Seattle: Seattle Art Museum, 2008), 30-31, fig. 6.
  • Nicholas Fox Weber, The Clarks of Cooperstown: Their Singer Sewing Machine Fortune, Their Great and Influential Art Collections, Their Forty-Year Feud (New York: Aldred A. Knopf, 2007), ill.
  • Michael Conforti et al., The Clark Brothers Collect: Impressionist and Early Modern Paintings, exh. cat. (Williamstown, Mass.: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 2006), 186, 282, 287–88, 316, 332, ill. p. 282, fig. 211.
  • Artists on Art: Observations by Yale Faculty on Selections from the Yale University Art Gallery (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Art Gallery, 1999), 34–37, 48, ill.
Object copyright
.
In Copyright
Additional information

Object/Work type

genre (visual works), human figures (visual works), interior architecture

Subject

dresses men modern sun sunlight windows women

Signed

Signed lower right "EDWARD HOPPER"

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