Edward Hopper said that <em>Nighthawks</em> was inspired by “a restaurant on New York’s Greenwich Avenue where two streets meet,” but the image—with its carefully constructed composition and lack of narrative—has
a timeless, universal quality that transcends its particular locale. One of the best-known images of twentieth-century art, the painting depicts an all-night diner in which three customers, all lost in their own thoughts,
have congregated. Hopper’s understanding of the expressive possibilities of light playing on simplified shapes gives the painting its beauty. Fluorescent lights had just come into use in the early 1940s, and the all-night
diner emits an eerie glow, like a beacon on the dark street corner. Hopper eliminated any reference to an entrance, and the viewer, drawn to the light, is shut out from the scene by a seamless wedge of glass. The four
anonymous and uncommunicative night owls seem as separate and remote from the viewer as they are from one another. (The red-haired woman was actually modeled by the artist’s wife, Jo.) Hopper denied that he purposefully
infused this or any other of his paintings with symbols of human isolation and urban emptiness, but he acknowledged that in <em>Nighthawks</em> “unconsciously, probably, I was painting the loneliness of
a large city.”
百度翻译：https://fanyi.baidu.com/
美国画家爱德华·霍普（Edward Hopper）弥漫着孤独氛围的代表作《夜游者》（Nighthawks，1942）带有一种古怪的撩人特质。通宵营业的快餐厅里，一位驼背的男士靠着细长的台面，独自坐在凳子上。餐厅明亮的灯光向室外光秃秃的人行道上投射出一道戏剧化的光影。餐厅光亮的弧形窗户与街边门面的格栅相交。这个著名的画面引诱着叙事的可能性，捕捉了城市生活忧郁的浪漫：在城市中产生联结的无限可能，却又无可避免地受挫。
在很多方面，《夜游者》是霍普有如黑色电影般风格的代表作。这些作品中，他以窥视的视角，描绘在光与影之间戏剧性的互动之下情感孤立的个体。艺术家把这些元素放入平淡无奇、无可辨认的城市空间中：路边餐厅、加油站、旅馆。作家阿兰·德·波顿（Alain de Botton）曾这样评价霍普的作品：“他开创了一个全新的艺术流派，将人物和题材置入一种临界空间：这些家与办公室之外的建筑、这些“过渡”的地点让我们感受到一种独特而疏离的诗意。”
