Today – Friday, Feb. 2 – is Groundhog Day, again. Will Punxatawney Phil and Staten Island Chuck see their shadows, foreshadowing six more weeks of winter?
Celebrate, again, with the delightful 1993 comedy “Groundhog Day,” in which an obnoxious weatherman (Bill Murray) – covering the Punxatawney, Pennsylvania, event – is doomed to repeat the day – until he gets it unselfishly right. Or take in Andrew Wyeth’s “Groundhog Day” (1959, tempera on panel) here. In Wyeth’s painting, part of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, logs stand in for the groundhogs, casting shadows that nonetheless through the artist’s alchemy, and a slice of sunlight, hold out hope for spring.
