Actualité ·
Edward Hopper's six early oils are copies
In his biography of Edward Hopper, an excerpt of which The Art Newspaper published on 20 October 2026, Louis Shadwick shows that the painter's six early oils, long considered original, are copies. Shadwick tracked down several of the works Hopper drew on.
Par la rédaction Walensky · 3 min de lecture
- 6early oil paintings, all copies
- 1895the year of Rowboat in Rocky Cove, signed and dated
- 1900autumn he enrolled at the New York School of Art
Edward Hopper's six early oils, painted before he entered art school and long considered original, are all copies of works by other artists. This is what the painter's biography by Louis Shadwick establishes, an excerpt of which The Art Newspaper published exclusively on 20 October 2026. Shadwick tracked down most of the originals Hopper copied; only the source of Church and Landscape remains unknown.
Around age 13, Hopper converted the attic of the family home in Nyack into a makeshift studio. He began oil painting there, after a few watercolours in the early 1890s. His oils, left in the attic, remained unseen for decades, then were presented after his death as his first original compositions.
Landscapes that have nothing to do with Nyack
Chez WalenskyCanal Soir PaisibleTableau Walenskyà partir de 273,90 €
Voir le tableau →
Old Ice Pond at Nyack, painted between 1898 and 1900, was thought to be one of the only oil depictions of Nyack by Hopper. Yet its title was not his: it was given by Reverend Arthayer R. Sanborn, its first owner, who found these oils in the attic in the late 1960s. The painting is in fact a faithful copy of A Winter Sunset by Bruce Crane, a tonalist artist then in vogue. Tonalism, an American style now forgotten, favoured veiled atmospheres and closely related tones.
Chez WalenskyBarque en bois doré sur eau roséeTableau Walenskyà partir de 273,90 €
Voir le tableau →
Rowboat in Rocky Cove, signed and dated 1895, was probably Hopper's first oil. Sanborn had titled it Rowboat on Hudson. It actually copies the watercolour Lake View by an unknown painter.
Models taken from a periodical
Both models appeared as collectible colour plates in the Art Interchange, a periodical widely read by amateur artists, which encouraged them to copy its pages: A Winter Sunset in December 1890, Lake View in February 1891. For Lake View, the instruction spoke of a subject "very simple and well suited to beginners". Hopper's beginnings thus seem more hesitant than assumed.
Chez WalenskyVoiliers Écume SolaireTableau Walenskyà partir de 273,90 €
Voir le tableau →
The other oils follow the same principle. Country Road (around 1896) copies a study by John Francis Murphy published in 1886 in the Art Interchange, and Ships (around 1898) a marine by Edward Moran. Church and Landscape, the only unsigned work, is also a copy, of unknown source, and not a church in Nyack. Clipper Ship Being Towed by Tug reproduces a lithograph by Fred Pansing published in 1893; it may predate Rowboat in Rocky Cove.
Hopper never indicated that any of these works were copies, and signed them with his initials or his name. According to Shadwick, this was not an intention to deceive but a youthful pride, these oils not being meant to be seen. He suggests Hopper may have produced no original oil before enrolling at the New York School of Art in autumn 1900.
These copies challenge, according to Shadwick, two myths: a gift that emerged in adolescence with almost no teaching, and little exposure to American art movements before art school. They rather show close study of contemporary painting from an early age, and the central role of illustrated periodicals in his vision of art.
Our view
Seeing a great painter begin by copying reminds us that we learn to look by remaking what we admire. At home, a beloved image keeps its interest whatever its origin: what you find in the image matters as much as its history.
Source: The Art Newspaper.
