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Edward Hopper

“We are all Edward Hopper’s painting now” declared Michael Tisserand, a New Orleans–based writer. This sentence owned thousands of likes in the Covid-19 period.

 

In Edward’s painting, a sense of isolation and indifference hit the inner part of modern people. If there is no lockdown, we would never have the urgent desire to get in touch with people like now. As we live in a digital age, people tend to spend precious time on social media instead of talking to real people. People may don’t notice that the cold distance, in reality, may ruin the interpersonal relationship one day. My works share many similarities with Edwards’ painting, although we use totally different media. I dig into the reasons and effect of modern people obsessing about virtual reality and escaping the real world. In Edward’s painting, there’s no digital device at that time but people still chose to stay alone: the lonely woman who sits on her bed, the couples who don’t communicate, the woman who eats alone in the restaurant... All these scenes happen in interior spaces, some in a home where it is supposed to be warm and sweet, and some in a bar where it is for people to talk and relax.

 

I’m also very interested in interior space. Interior space offers a sense of safety to people, however, this intimate space also could be the place to hold many cold facts, like domestic violence, the cold relationship between family, the affairs, and so on. We didn’t see any happy face in Edward’s painting, so it’s not hard to guess the protagonist must suffer something in his or her life, loneliness or pain.

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