Author Topic: Art and cars #3 - Solved! Edward Hopper and a few Buicks (Read 1698 times)

Ray B. · « **on:** January 06, 2009, 07:26:35 AM »

Who is he, and what car can he be associated with?

Art and cars. Painters, writers, musicians, actors, movie makers: in a nutshell, artists. Cars of special importance in their work, or in their life.
This one is worth 2 points, one for the artist, one for the car.
Rules of this puzzle is: you identify the artist, you have one week to find the car. After that, the hunt is opened and anyone can rob you of your second point.

If you haven't registered yet, you need to do so in order to reply with your answer.
Also, please be sure to check out our other puzzles, and, please post a puzzle of your own if you'd like - the more, the merrier.

Thanks!

Otto Puzzell · « **Reply #1 on:** January 19, 2009, 05:19:18 AM »

Opera singer?

Ray B. · « **Reply #2 on:** January 19, 2009, 05:30:03 AM »

Not an opera singer.
I appreciate any interest in this kind of puzzle, but are you sure you're allowed to answer in this section, boss?

If there is no expert guess I'll move it upstairs soon anyway.

Otto Puzzell · « **Reply #3 on:** January 19, 2009, 06:13:51 AM »

D'oh!

I'll go sit in the corner.

Ray B. · « **Reply #4 on:** January 21, 2009, 03:49:28 AM »

And up again.

Otto Puzzell · « **Reply #5 on:** January 21, 2009, 04:03:42 AM »

Picasso?

Ray B. · « **Reply #6 on:** January 21, 2009, 04:04:51 AM »

Not Picasso, but you're getting warmer.

Otto Puzzell · « **Reply #7 on:** January 21, 2009, 04:08:10 AM »

Norman Rockwell?

Ray B. · « **Reply #8 on:** January 21, 2009, 04:19:45 AM »

Even warmer.
Now I think this one needs some precisions. Although this man's work often appears related to the our car culture, one can find in it very very few cars, and only one or two can be identified.

Otto Puzzell · « **Reply #9 on:** January 21, 2009, 04:37:42 AM »

Ted Laws, the railroad painter?

Otto Puzzell · « **Reply #10 on:** January 21, 2009, 04:50:11 AM »

Maybe I'm off track (pun intended).

If it be Rockwell, he was featured in ads for the 1959 Lincoln.

Ray B. · « **Reply #11 on:** January 21, 2009, 05:22:19 AM »

Neither Rockwell nor Ted Laws, but he painted tracks and trains more often than cars.

DynaMike · « **Reply #12 on:** January 21, 2009, 06:30:47 AM »

Looks like an early portrait of Edward Hopper, who in 1927 earned enough money (by selling 'Two on the Aisle') to buy his first car, a two year old Dodge...

Ray B. · « **Reply #13 on:** January 21, 2009, 08:13:33 AM »

That's two points for Dynamike!
Edward Hopper it is.
But, although your 1925 Dodge answer is somehow more than I bargained for, I was more precisely asking (see a few posts above) for a car he had painted. I checked his work (I must have all of it in several books), and I count only 4 paintings with cars. In those, only 2 can be identified with some certainty (make and year).
Any one of the two will satisfy me. I hold the second point for you a week. I'm sure this will be no problem for you.

DynaMike · « **Reply #14 on:** January 21, 2009, 10:17:20 AM »

In 'Western Motel' there's a 1954 Buick; there's a non-descript car in 'Prospect Street' scene in Gloucester; and surprisingly there is no car in 'Gas'...

Ray B. · « **Reply #15 on:** January 21, 2009, 10:47:41 AM »

That was fast! The 1954 Buick was what I was after.
There are also two nondescript cars in "Cars and rocks". And Hopper's own car interior in the watercolor "Jo in Wyoming". But I've been too lazy to search with which car interior it matched.
Probably not a 1948 Ford as in the third painting (not by Hopper).

DynaMike · « **Reply #16 on:** January 21, 2009, 02:12:33 PM »

I think "Jo in Wyoming" was painted in 1946, so it cannot be a 1948 Ford. I don't know yet what it is - a bit puzzled by the three-spoke steering wheel.

Ray B. · « **Reply #17 on:** January 21, 2009, 06:14:47 PM »

Again, impossible to add the attachments I wanted tonight (Western motel, Jo in Wyoming and Edward Hopper fixes a flat). I hope it will be better tomorrow.

I think I will put a third point at stake for the puzzler who can identify, by its interior the car shown in "Jo in Wyoming". It would solve an artistic mystery after all, so it's well worth one. Some may have the picture somewhere, but it can also be easily found on the net.
That dashboard could be a 1942-46 Ford, but if so Hopper omitted the big round speedo. And the steering wheel could be an aftermarket item, but I couldn't find one like it.
So this point will be attributed if az puzzler can produce a photo of a matching dashboard, and one of the steering wheel if it's not the original one.

Ray B. · « **Reply #18 on:** January 22, 2009, 04:48:59 AM »

The pics are finally uploaded for all of you art lovers.
Dynamike, I'll tally the points when I'll move this to the solved section. Otherwise I get mixed up.

DynaMike · « **Reply #19 on:** January 22, 2009, 05:41:18 AM »

The loadspeaker grille in the middle looks like a 1942 Ford (but those had two round clocks of which one should have been visible), and the steering wheel like a 1938 Buick (but those had a flat loadspeaker grille)... Artistic freedom ?

DynaMike · « **Reply #20 on:** January 22, 2009, 06:46:05 AM »

At the end, it did work to get the pics in my post...

Ray B. · « **Reply #21 on:** January 22, 2009, 06:52:24 AM »

One sure thing is: whatever the make, I know what model this is and I'm gonna ask for it.

Ehhxekt · « **Reply #22 on:** January 27, 2009, 07:59:29 AM »

I don’t know what model it is but I think I know the make: the car in which Mrs Hopper is sitting and working on her picture looks like a Buick, just as DynaMike suggested, only from a year later: 1939. (As far as I know, the Hoppers did own a ’39 Buick.)

Ray B. · « **Reply #23 on:** January 27, 2009, 09:14:51 AM »

Ehhxekt, you are right!
We can see that Hopper painted the steering wheel very exactly, but that he didn't bother to paint the fine chrome lines around the instruments. A 1939 Buick it is (I don't know where you found that the Hoppers owned one, I didn't go to the extent of reading all my books to check that, but you've brought out the proof). If he also owned the 1954 from "Western Motel" his also tends to prove that Hopper especially liked Buicks.

I said I knew what model it was because I believed I recognized the plywood inner door panel of a station wagon. But Buick didn't make woodies in 1939, although I didn't check if some coachbuilder offered one. But as you can see on this picture of the interior of a Special, what Hopper painted can also be the door panel of a sedan. So, let's forget about the model.

This is amazing. History in the making.
Two points for Dynamike, one for Ehhxekt.

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Author Topic: Art and cars #3 - Solved! Edward Hopper and a few Buicks (Read 1698 times)