No over-night get-away trip for the two of us this year.
Pandemic issues, don’t you know.
Still, travel close to home is acceptable, so last week for our anniversary we headed to Indianapolis to check out an art exhibit at “Newfields” as The Indianapolis Museum of Art now prefers to be branded. “As you wish,” I think to myself as I consider the new name, although I’m sure I will continue to think of it by its old name just as I have continued to call the outdoor concert venue in Noblesville “Deer Creek” through all its name changes.
Earlier in the summer, I was excited to read the museum would be presenting “Edward Hopper and the American Hotel.” Hopper is one of my favorite painters, and Becky appreciates his work as well. I like his precise lines and clean drawings. I am interested in his subject matter which so often is how a very few lone people relate to the buildings, houses and other structures in which they find themselves. This show considers his preoccupation with the hotel rooms and roadside motel spaces that since early 20th century have been so much a part of the American way of travel.
Critics sometimes point out how the people in his paintings seem distant and removed from each other. This tendency to feel alone in a crowd or a small group is also a part of the American travel experience. Hotel Lobby, the most significant Hopper work in the museum’s collection, shows four people in their separate inner worlds going about their business while obviously not relating to each other. It is a common travel experience, especially perhaps business travel, to be with others through circumstance rather than personal choice.
Walking through the galleries, I was reminded of the time I spent many years ago as a road musician. The paintings, sketches and other objects in the show triggered memories of the rooms my bandmates and I would share sometimes for weeks on end. We were alone together.
Sometimes we played six nights a week at a chain motel such as a Ramada or Holiday Inn where rooms were part of the contract. We would settle into the consistency of bedspreads, writing tables, telephones, televisions and generic artwork that was so interchangeable with the previous motel we could almost forget we were now in Des Moines rather than Omaha.
Often the only noticeable difference in the locale was the local “hip” scene that we would search out during the daytime. I found myself on my own, browsing local record shops and independent bookstores.
When the band was booked at a club-type venue with no rooms provided, to save money we would seek out the cheapest motels we could find. The band consisted of five guys and a female singer/keyboard player, so we usually got two rooms. We wanted to keep it professional, so we drew straws and the losers would share the room with the girl. She accepted the lack of privacy and our sophomoric shenanigans as best she could.
These rooms invariably were smaller and more shabby than the rooms at the chain motels. The postcards in the lobby — which must have been taken during the Eisenhower administration — showed a pristine swimming pool set in the center of a square of two-story buildings displaying rows of neat motel rooms. The reality was the pool likely had not been operable nor the lobby carpet been replaced since just after the postcard was made. But at least the rooms didn’t cost much.
I like art that is graceful in itself and allows me to appreciate the artist’s skill. I like art that provokes me to think. “Edward Hopper and the American Hotel” provides just such opportunities.
It runs until Oct. 25. Due to coronavirus restrictions, you must call and make a reservation. The Hopper show is worth a visit to Newfields or The Indianapolis Museum of Art or whatever you wish to call it.
Norman Knight, a retired Clark-Pleasant Middle School teacher, writes this weekly column for the Daily Journal. Send comments to [email protected].
