The Waiting Room
Tooker, George
Primary Category:
Visual Arts /
Painting/Drawing
Genre: Egg tempera on wood
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Annotated by:
- Aull, Felice
- Date of entry: Dec-16-2008
- Last revised: May-23-2012
Summary
On the viewer's right, in receding repetition, are narrow, numbered, blue wooden, open stalls. Inside the stalls, and only partially visible, people are standing, dressed in street clothes, either alone or in couples, their coats still on. In the most forward stall there are no people--only two coats that hang from coat hooks, their owners no longer "waiting." The stalls are open at bottom and top and are illuminated by repeating fluorescent ceiling tubes. In the lower right foreground sits a bald man dressed in a blue jacket and brown pants who looks down the narrow corridor from which the stalls branch off. In the lower left foreground is a bench on which two men are dozing -- one man leans forward with his head tilted down, his face obscured by the hat he is wearing. The other man has his eyes closed, his head tilted backwards. Both are still wearing their coats.
Standing in front of the dozing men, all the way to the viewer's left, is a looming figure -- a man who stares out at the viewer, his thick glasses hiding his eyes, his mouth turned down in a suspicious frown. He wears a dark blue coat and a brown hat. Scraps of paper and possibly cigarette butts litter the floor in front of the sitting men. Blue is a prominent color in this painting but some of the figures wear bright red sweaters, shoes, or a dress, and a red scarf hangs from one of the hanging coats. These individual touches of color seem to represent attempts by the sequestered people to preserve both their individuality and vitality.
Standing in front of the dozing men, all the way to the viewer's left, is a looming figure -- a man who stares out at the viewer, his thick glasses hiding his eyes, his mouth turned down in a suspicious frown. He wears a dark blue coat and a brown hat. Scraps of paper and possibly cigarette butts litter the floor in front of the sitting men. Blue is a prominent color in this painting but some of the figures wear bright red sweaters, shoes, or a dress, and a red scarf hangs from one of the hanging coats. These individual touches of color seem to represent attempts by the sequestered people to preserve both their individuality and vitality.
Miscellaneous
Dated 1969
Primary Source
George Tooker. Eds. Robert Cozzolino, Marshall N. Price, & M. Melissa Wolfe. (London & New York: Merrell) 2008, p. 137
Commentary