Le Pont des Arts, 1907

Narrator: Hopper made this painting while living in Paris for several months in 1907.

Kim Conaty: The palette is very soft, light, very impressionist in style, in brushstroke. This painting depicts what is known as the Bridge of the Arts in Paris crossing the Seine between the Left Bank and the Musée du Louvre. Before he goes to Paris, the palette is a much kind of earthier palette, more browns, much darker, less luminosity. And one thing that he did clearly pick up in Paris was a new approach and interest in light. 

Narrator: Hopper admired Impressionists like Edgar Degas. But he seems to have had no contact with modern artists like Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, who were just beginning to gain notoriety. And his letters home make clear that although he saw some important exhibitions featuring Post-Impressionists like Paul Cézanne, they didn’t pique his interest—even though they were at the height of their influence on younger Parisian artists.

Kim Conaty: What he found instead fascinating during his time in Paris was the city itself. It was the views just outside of his door. It was the way that the natural landscape and the built environment intersected in an urban space.