“Nighthawks”, painted in 1942, shows an all-night diner on a city corner. Three customers and a counterman exist together, but apart, each seemingly absorbed in their own thoughts as the empty street wraps around them.

Nighthawks is often interpreted as a depiction of wartime anxiety or urban alienation, but Hopper denied any specific narrative, saying it was just a restaurant in Greenwich Village. It sold almost immediately for $3,000 – a significant sum at the time – to the Art Institute of Chicago where it remains on display to this day.