Although she is one of the twentieth-century artists who made Modernism unmistakably American, Georgia O'Keeffe channeled the European influences of Rodin, Matisse, and Picasso into an extremely personal vision of landscape. Encouraged by Arthur Wesley Dow's fusion of Japanese art, Art...
[more]Although she is one of the twentieth-century artists who made Modernism unmistakably American, Georgia O'Keeffe channeled the European influences of Rodin, Matisse, and Picasso into an extremely personal vision of landscape. Encouraged by Arthur Wesley Dow's fusion of Japanese art, Art Nouveau's approach to color and form, and Kandinsky's belief that art should reflect the inner reality of the artist rather than be beholden to nature, O'Keeffe began to paint what her inner eye saw. The dynamic, organic forms that resulted got her an exhibit in 1916 at "291," Alfred Stieglitz's New York gallery. An artistic symbiosis developed between Stieglitz and O'Keeffe. Stieglitz used her as a model, making endless photographs that emphasized her otherworldliness and androgynous beauty. O'Keeffe allowed this objectification because "I can see myself [in Stieglitz's photographs], and it has helped me say what I want to say -- in paint."
What she wanted to say -- and how she said it -- caused a sensation. Continuing her work with organic forms, and influenced by the photographic close-up, she embarked in 1924 on an exploration into the interior of flowers, starting with "Petunia No. 2." While critics saw this work as revealing her femininity, the layers of petals ineluctably vulvar, the stamen arching in the clasp of a calla lily undeniably phallic, O'Keeffe vehemently rejected sexualized interpretations of her work, and resisted being marginalized as a woman artist. Her work was about abstraction and seeing the underlying forms in nature. Fundamentally, it was about color: "The large white flower with the golden heart is something I have to say about white."
Starting in 1929, O'Keeffe summered in New Mexico, absorbing the colors and forms of the Southwest. New objects fascinated her, such as the skull bones she found bleached by the desert. She perceived them as still alive with the potential of resurrection. Her focus on these relics and the surrounding landscape also reflects her increasing awareness of Native American culture.
A 1970 Whitney Museum retrospective capped her career and marked her arrival as a feminist icon. As always, her personal image was part of her impact. Photos of her long-skirted, still-spry figure striding through the desert vastness, coupled with the meditative composure of her weathered face and piercing eyes, made her a model of wisdom.
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