Rocks and Sea 1919

Edward Hopper made "Rocks and Sea", an oil on canvas, which is now here at the Whitney. The way he's daubed the paint on, you can really feel the process of him trying to capture the sea air, and the weight of those rocks. Look closely, and you can see the physicality of the paint itself. It's thick in places, especially where he's built up the craggy surfaces, but then it thins out into a wash as it reaches that intense, deep blue sea. I love how he's used these short, staccato strokes to build form, like little jabs of colour that somehow make up these monumental shapes. See that band of green at the bottom? Those strokes feel like a shorthand for nature, almost like he's daring you to imagine the details for yourself. Hopper wasn't afraid of ambiguity, and that’s what makes this painting so compelling. You can see some of this same process at play in the work of someone like Marsden Hartley, where the American landscape becomes almost a psychological space.