The Blue Hour Cafe

This painting has two inspirations. The color palette has been taken from the painting Cafe Terrace at night by Vincent Van Gogh and the composition is heavily inspired from Edward Hopper paintings. Now, I’m not an art student but i like reading a lot. What I read about Edward Hopper was that he painted solitary figures, figures in diners and windows acting as emotional boundaries. This particular painting shows two persons, sitting quietly in a cafe in the evening, doing their own thing while the rain quietly falls outside. The warm yellow light contrasts against the blue outside. It casts a beautiful reflection of the rainwater on the floor. It somehow also reminds me of Jazz songs and New Orleans. My mind is like a vast vessel with many thoughts. Sometimes I think more than an average person. One of the thoughts that come into my mind is that if i were not living this life, then what type of life would i be living ? I’ve thought of many glamorous options and professions - I could have been a deep sea diver, concert pianist, mountaineer, someone who lives in Alaska , rides horses, writes books, flies planes and what not. But here i am. Living an extremely ordinary life. A textbook life. And this sometimes bothers me a lot. Enough for me to think about it when I’m lying in bed at night. I usually block these thoughts by reading. A lot of this bother also goes away when I paint. When I paint, i live through my paintings. I live through the scenes i make, the colors i use, the landscapes i make. I live through the memories i try to recreate on canvas. Reading and Art have always been my escapes. Reading feels like a hug to me when i sit down on my bed at night after a long day and pick up a book. Maybe in my next life I’m going to do one of the things i dream about. But for this life, i have my books and my paints. And that’s enough for now.