INDIANAPOLIS – Explore the highly anticipated exhibition, “Edward Hopper and the American Hotel” presented by Schahet Hotels at the Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields from July 19 through Oct. 25. This exhibition will be welcoming guests back inside the IMA Galleries for the first time since mid-March. Travel back in time to experience the iconic American painter like never before in this major loan exhibition.
“Newfields is thrilled to welcome guests back inside the Indianapolis Museum of Art with this major exhibition,” said Dr. Charles L. Venable, director and CEO of Newfields. “While Hopper has long been considered one of the most important American masters, interest in his work has soared during this period of anxiousness and isolation. His depictions of individuals alone in their hotel rooms and even completely empty rooms have even more relevance now.”
The exhibition will feature 57 of Edward Hopper’s (1882-1967) paintings, drawings, watercolors and magazine covers – including the Indianapolis Museum of Art’s iconic Hotel Lobby – that show his fascination with commonplace hospitality settings of the time. Hopper’s work is often explored through a lens of loneliness, but American Hotel provides a different context for the celebrated American artist’s work. Guests will discover how 20th-century Americans participated in travel culture, depending on their race, gender and class, and see how Hopper’s works fit into a larger tradition of the role of the hotel in art. Hopper’s paintings and works on paper will be presented alongside 31 works by over 20 other artists including Derrick Adams, David Hockney, Cindy Sherman and John Singer Sargent.
The works will be accompanied by firsthand accounts of travel culture in Hopper’s time in the form of photographs, postcards and personal stories from Americans of different walks of life. While the white artist and his wife Josephine “Jo” Nivision Hopper could check into virtually any hotel of their choice in the mid-20th century, this was not true for Black Americans nor single women because of racism and sexism. These facts are highlighted in the show to give a more accurate depiction of hotel culture in America during this time.
“Edward Hopper and the American Hotel” was organized by the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, in partnership with the Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields. The exhibition was conceived and curated by Dr. Leo G. Mazow, the Virginia Museum of Fine Art’s Louise B. and J. Hartwood Cochrane Curator of American Art, and curated for the Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields by Anna Stein, Assistant Curator of Works on Paper.
An exhibition catalog complete with removable maps of Hoppers travels will be available for purchase in the Museum & Garden Shop as well as the exhibition shop at the end of the exhibition.
Newfields indoor spaces including the Indianapolis Museum of Art, the Lilly House, the Museum & Garden Shop, and The Café, will open to the public on July 19. The Garden, The Virginia B. Fairbanks Art & Nature Park and The Beer Garden will also be open. Newfields will require all guests to wear facial covering while inside and maintain a social distance of 6 feet. All guests, including members, will need to reserve tickets in advance on the Newfields website. This process will allow staff to safely control the crowd size to comply with large gathering protocols. Learn more and reserve your tickets at discovernewfields.org.