Edward Hopper-Nighthawks Poster

Edward Hopper completed *Nighthawks* in 1942, shortly after the United States entered World War II. Hopper had stated that the scene was inspired by a restaurant at the intersection of two streets on Greenwich Avenue in New York; however, the painting notably lacks any visible entrance to the restaurant. This choice leaves the viewer outside the bright glass, making the four people inside seem even more unreachable. Although Hopper denied that he had consciously used loneliness as a symbol, he admitted that he might have unconsciously depicted the loneliness of a big city. Glowing with the new fluorescent lighting of the era, the diner appears—amid the dark streets of the war years—both as a safe haven and, strangely, as a display window left exposed.