Edward Hopper is best known today for his famous 1942 painting Nighthawks. As a young man, he studied painting in New York with William Merritt Chase and Robert Henri, and like many young artists of his generation, he traveled to Paris to learn the latest trends in art before establishing himself as an illustrator in New York. He began to experiment with printmaking around 1915, and by the 1920s, he had found a uniquely American style featuring urban landscapes. A masterful watercolorist, he perfected his evocation of brilliant seaside light while painting the Victorian mansions of Gloucester, Massachusetts.