Located in the Reginald and Ethel Wrytoff wing of the museum, Edward Hopper's Going Out Of Business depicts a despairing gas station attendant beating his head against the pumps because he has no customers.
Using a subtle combination of painterly skill and his own profound feelings of despondency and depression, Hopper seems to be asking the viewer why anyone in their right mind would open a gas station on such a desolate stretch of country road in the middle of the night? To which we reply: what sort of maniac would be painting such a gloomy scene at that hour in the first place? Why don't you do another one of those pretty Cape Cod lighthouses?
But, as always with Hopper, artist and viewer reach a stalemate. Although we admire his rendering of a godforsaken gas station in the back of beyond, nobody wants to buy a postcard of it. At least, we never sell any in the museum shop.
