Countless artists have painted the Brooklyn Bridge. But not Edward Hopper.
Instead of focusing on the city’s most beloved and beatified bridge, Hopper in 1928 used the nearby but less-loved Manhattan Bridge to depict the isolation and solitude of modern urban life.
“In his powerful and evocative painting, Manhattan Bridge Loop, Edward Hopper has frozen this transportation nexus of bridge, streets, railways, and crowded tenements in lower Manhattan in an eerie stillness and bathed it with cold crystalline light,” states the Addison Gallery of Art in Massachusetts, where the painting is on display.
“A solitary figure, trudging along under the shadow of the blank embankment, suggests the human alienation possible within the urban life.”
Tags: Edward Hopper Manhattan Bridge Loop, Edward Hopper New York, Manhattan Bridge NYC, New York in the 1920s, Paintings New York City 1920s
Ephemeral New York 
June 10, 2019 at 5:43 am |
Manhattan Bridge? Loop? Somebody has some ‘splainin’ to do.”
June 10, 2019 at 2:10 pm |
The Manhattan Bridge approach was drastically redesigned at some point in the 20th century….
June 10, 2019 at 9:42 am |
[…] Manhattan Bridge Loop, Edward Hopper […]
June 10, 2019 at 11:22 am |
Even today manhattan bridge is practical utilitarian choice over the far more romantic Brooklyn bridge.
But to Mr. Hopper I’d say “Wherever you go there you are.”
June 10, 2019 at 2:10 pm |
But it figures Hopper would go for the Manhattan, in the shadow of its far more popular neighbor bridge
June 10, 2019 at 6:27 pm |
One of the more notorious aspects of the bridge is its colonnade and arch on the Manhattan end. According to rumors in the early 20th century, it was designed by a gynecologist. https://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photo-manhattan-bridge-triumphal-arch-colonnade-entrance-new-york-city-image78401514
June 12, 2019 at 1:44 pm |
Like the Selena Meyer Presidential Library on Veep.
December 30, 2019 at 8:41 am |
[…] Hopper has painted the Manhattan Bridge before; “Manhattan Bridge Loop,” from 1928, depicts this least-celebrated East River crossing with “eerie stillness” and […]