TODAY, WE ARE living an event that has no parallels in living memory. You may say, it’s just a virus but look at how dramatically it has changed most—if not all—of our realities. The biggest being our ability to open a door and step out… for a stroll, a party, for work, to shop or to even pick up the daily newspaper. If life was an art movement then we are definitely living in Surrealism today. But then again, even before Surrealism arrived on the scene, Art has always been pushing the envelope. Artists through time have been avant-gardists in their own quiet ways, imagining different answers to what it means to see and to be, furthermore addressing them in their own particular idioms.

Who better than the painters know about creating strong feelings through a change in perspective and light. Throwing us into the deep-end of the human mind to help heal ourselves of traumas that we didn’t even know existed. Why else would people weep upon seeing ‘La Gioconda’ or be left speechless gazing at Rothko’s colour fields. Which is why I began a series of QUARANTINE ART for Hunar TV, a web channel for the Arts that I co-founded with my partner Sahar Zaman. The idea behind it was to post a picture daily or every other day of an artwork by artists from the 20th century who understood what isolation means to the human animal.

It was one of those things that you don’t plan but fall into place perfectly with an exquisite sense of timing. As the curator of the series, I was looking for works from across the world that commented, however obliquely on isolation and how it plays on the human mind. There were some artists that came to mind almost automatically when one thought of isolation. Others had to be searched and dragged out from obscurity. I am happy to say that over a month of posting pictures of paintings by such amazing and gifted artists, I have successfully curated a list—a best of list—of those whom I would readily recommend for this new and unexpected category of ‘QUARANTINE ARTISTS’.

Edward HOPPER is one of the first artists that comes to mind when one thinks of isolation. Somewhat a legend, in his lifetime Hopper created paintings that would define the dynamics of space and privilege of the upper crust American life. Hopper’s America practiced ‘social distancing’ much before the Corona virus made it compulsory.