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Urban Isolation: Loneliness in Modern Life, explores the theme of the isolation of the individual within busy urban environments during the times of American Modernism. Viewed through a series of movements and periods, I tried to trace how the artist attempts to come to terms with the dramatic juxtaposition created between the liveliness of the city and the loneliness of its inhabitants.

Beginning with Edward Hopper's, Nighthawks, 1942, Hopper illustrated the inside of a almost haunting diner, where bright artificial lights contrast with the darkness outside, emphasizing the cozy interior and the empty-streets, resonating with the theme of loneliness/desolation. Through combining Edward Hopper's Nighthawks-the very embodiment of the American Modernist picture of urban alienation-with a Gordon Parks photograph entitled American Gothic, the American ideal contrasted with the reality of invisible labor by African American workers.

In Gordon Parks, American Gothic, 1942 photograph inverts the patriotic and rural idealism icons present in Wood's original to reflect the sense of isolation many African Americans felt in a country that rarely offered them the same freedoms as their white citizens. The contrast between the character of Watson in a stolid, graceful pose and her simple, dowdy cleaning implements underlines the distance she inhabits from the American dream. Her isolation is one that is not only physical but cultural, too, underlining how people might feel cut off or "outside" mainstream culture, contributing to the loneliness of exclusion.

In addition, the surrealist contribution by Salvador Dali, The Persistence of Memory, 1931, in which desolation is caused by passing time is connected with the greater theme of existential loneliness. Dali's works whisks the viewer away to a deserted landscape of surrealism, in which time is melting away with an existential futility of loneliness. A stark, almost vacant background deeply evokes a feeling of timelessness and isolation, while the melting clocks speak to time in a fluid and impermanent way, suggesting a sense of futility and loneliness in the face of the transient nature of life.

Taken together, these works represent a multifaceted exploration of loneliness along multiple dimensions: Hopper's Nighthawks speaks to the urban solitude that often characterizes city life; Parks' American Gothic addresses the cultural and racial solitude that is often the experience of the marginalized individual; Dalí's The Persistence of Memory speaks to the existential loneliness of the psyche. Through physical, societal, and existential loneliness, these works all combined to show how there can be solitude in just about any manner, form, or environment that one is presenting themselves within.

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Hopper's work captures a moment of stillness in a late-night diner. The sharp contrasts of light and shadow, the lack of interaction between the figures, and the viewer’s exclusion from the space all contribute to the sense of urban isolation.

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Art Gordon Parks, American Gothic, Washington, D.C., 1942. Courtesy of the Gordon Parks Foundation

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In this iconic image, Parks conveys the interpretation of American Gothicism through portraying the hidden labor of Ella Watson, an african american, standing against the backdrop of the American flag. This photograph reflects her isolation within a country that promises freedom and equality but fails to deliver this promise to its citizens of color.

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This surrealist painting, with its melting clocks in a desolate landscape, is symbolic of the inexorable passage of time and its correlate of existential loneliness. Dalí's work could give off feelings of desolation and the transient nature of reality, connecting to the wider theme of personal isolation.