Donne di scarse fortune
In New York Movie (1939), an usherette stands by the stairwell of an ornate pre-war theatre. Whereas the audience is sunk in semidarkness, she is bathed in a rich pool of yellow light. As often in Hopper's work, her expression suggests that her thoughts have carried her elsewhere. She is beautiful and young, with carefully curled blond hair, and there are a touching fragility and anxiety about her which elict both care and desire. Despite her lowly job, she is the painting's guardian of integrity and intelligence, the Cinderella of the cinema. Hopper seems to be delivering a subtle commentary on, and indictment of, the medium itself, implying that a technological invention associated with communal excitement has paradoxically succeeded in curtailing our concern for others. The painting's power hangs on the juxtaposition of two ideas: first, that the woman is more interesting than the film, and second, that she is being ignored because of the film. In their haste to take their seats, the members of the audience have omitted to notice that they have in their midst a heroine more sympatheric and compelling than any character Hollywood could offer up. It is left to the painter, working in a quieter, more observant idiom, to rescue what the film has encouraged its viewers not to see.
Alain de Botton, The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work, Pantheon Books NY, 2009
Commenti
Yes: the light seems to suggest that interpretation.
However you could speculate more.
That one of the people from the audience does not ignore the usherette.
They go together have a nice dinner, after 2 years they are married, she quit the job, then they divorce and she obtain half of her salary.
Now just figure out the same canvas, but in a Roy Lichtenstein's style.
The light now is on the audience and we can read someone's thoughts in a a balloon: "it is so much better to dream about than struggling with reality.