The Jazz Age

Associated both with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Hull House, Hoeckner here transformed a burlesque performance into a frightening scene of ghoulish patrons gawking at a performer’s striptease. The curvaceous woman smiles right back at the crowd as she tosses her underwear, while behind her is a compressed group of jazz musicians with generalized features and instruments. The orbs and jutting diagonal lines that cross the composition recall the solar system, a subject the artist turned to later in life.