Georgia OʹKeeffe is known as the "mother of American modernism." Her works were interpreted according to Freud, but she herself did not recognize such analogies. She loved to paint flowers and leaves, landscapes with rocks, and all her paintings found their admirers. In 2014, her White Flower No. 1 was sold at auction for more than $ 4 million. This is a record for a painting by a woman.
Childhood and youth
Georgia OʹKiff, whose paintings we will examine later, was born back in 1887 in the city of San Prairie, Wisconsin. Her parents Francis and Ida OʹKiff kept a dairy farm. The father was Irish, and the mother of the father was Count George Victor Totto. A granddaughter was named in his honor. Georgia was the eldest of seven children. By the age of 10, she decided to become an artist. Over time, the family moved to Villasburg, Virginia. Here she was the best student of an art school. After graduating from school in 1905, the girl studied for a year at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. After moving to New York, she received a scholarship for participating in outdoor work for a still life with a dead rabbit. In 1908, Georgia attended the Rodin watercolors exhibition, which was organized by 291 renowned photographer and modernist Alfred Stiglitz (1864 - 1946) in his gallery.
Search for the way
At 20, OʹKiff refused to work as an artist, as she was annoyed by the smell of solvents. She began to teach painting, but often changed jobs in different cities and states. At the same time, the young artist adopted the experience of the teachers who were with her. In 1912, she became interested in the principles of oriental design.
New York again
By 1915 - 1916, she again began to paint. Georgia OʹKiff painted her paintings at this time with charcoal and watercolor. They gathered enough for the exhibition. The work was abstract. She drew the Blue Line repeatedly. One of the first options was made by watercolor on paper in 1916.
What she wanted to say is hard to understand. In abstraction, everyone sees only what he wants to see. Stiglitz exhibited ten of her works in Texas in his gallery. They did not meet, but they corresponded for two years and finally decided to live together, although Alfred was 23 years older and also married. The photograph of 1918, which is placed at the beginning of the article, dates to this time. In total, Stiglitz made no less than 350 portraits of her. In 1924, his divorce was approved by a judge, and the artist and photographer got married. The 1919 work, Blue Line, is strikingly different from the first versions.
And it is made differently - with oil on canvas. The painting is certainly decorative and speaks of a good sense of color of the painter. But what is she talking about? The author is very fond of saying one of the most brilliant philosophers - Schopenhauer: "He who thinks clearly, he clearly states." This also applies to painting. Georgia O.Kiff painted with a blue line, definitely just enjoying the game of color, form. In the second case, also the ability to convey the depth of space. Perhaps there is nothing more to say about them.
Style changes
In the 1920s Georgia OʹKiff began to paint large-scale paintings. Natural forms (flowers, foliage) seem to look through a magnifying glass. In 1924, she painted her first huge flower - “Petunia No. 2”. She presented this work at the 1925 exhibition along with the landscapes of New York. These were transformed skyscrapers, consisting of patterned sparkling structures.
New Mexico
In 1929, OʹKiff began to look for new sources of inspiration for work. She wanted to avoid the summer surrounded by the Stiglitz family and his friends, to retire. For 16 years, she will come here in New Mexico every summer. It is attracted to ancient Mexican architecture, vegetation, skulls and bones in the sand - symbols of the desert. And in 1945, Georgia will buy an old adobe house and settle in it in 1946 after the death of her husband.
"Autumn leaves"
The Autumn Leaves painting we present was painted in 1924. The artist collects shells, beautiful stones, bones on Lake George, as well as bright leaves that amaze her imagination with a variety of shapes and colors.
Most of the leaves of her palette acquire all shades of red, crimson, ocher and green, creating a festive mood of autumn. These oak leaves cling to the plane, overlapping each other. But they do not merge with each other. They are isolated from each other. All details are enlarged. The rest of the summer is highlighted in green. Between 1922 and 1931, Georgia created 29 paintings on the theme of autumn leaves. Here is Autumn Leaves (1927),
which illustrates the exquisite balance that the artist has established between abstraction and realism.
Leaves stacked on top of each other. The background seems to be a little cropped. But on the first sheet, as through a magnifying glass, we see enlarged veins. The leaves seem to be fed forward and ask them to carefully consider, while we usually walk on them without looking closely. During this period, Georgia OʹKiff forms paintings in a new nascent style that characterizes her most iconic images.
The growth of popularity and the death of her husband
In the 30s and 40s, her works became more and more recognizable. She takes part in exhibitions. The painting with a deer skull and wildflowers became one of her most famous works. In 1946, she was, as usual, in the summer of New Mexico and found out about her husband’s poor health. He died, and his ashes were scattered over Lake George. Georgia OʹKeeffe spent another three years in New York. At this time, she was engaged in matters of inheritance. Then she permanently moved to New Mexico.
"Belladonna"
The Bella Donna that you see now was written in 1939.
The artist was fascinated by the flower and created a large series. She herself spoke about it like this: “No one sees a flower, because it is actually small. We don’t have time to look at it. So I decided to draw it big so that everyone would be surprised looking at it. " The second picture presented here is also devoted to belladonna - Bella Donna.
The background has become more saturated. The flowers themselves began to play with yellowish, pinkish, bluish and turquoise tones that set off the whiteness of the petals. With the enthusiasm of the pedant, the artist achieves more and more resemblance to a real living flower, at the same time creating a generalized image.
"Black iris"
Black Iris, painted in oil on canvas, belongs to the early works of 1926.
But he caused a heated discussion. Firstly, he is considered the undoubted masterpiece of OʹKiff. And then they talk and argue about him. Having expanded the petals beyond what is possible, the artist makes the viewer observe all of his smallest details. If the picture were not monumental (its dimensions are 91.4 x 75.9 cm), then they would be missed. Her husband considered the paintings of this group to be arrogant. He was shocked by them. Take a look at yourself and try to understand what the secret is.
Artistic vision and individual style
OʹKiff was looking for abstract forms of real objects. With great subtlety, she found the sophisticated nuances of form, light and color. Landscapes, flowers, bones were studied by her in series sequentially throughout the year, and if required, several years. Or even decades. The works of the 50s, 60s, 70s rely on images already present in the paintings of the mid 40s. Flowers on her canvases are often called erotic, which is not entirely true. Georgia OʹKiff paintings energizes a great artist. At the same time, life experience is transferred to the canvas. In addition, in the paintings there is that individuality that initially she personally has. Her paintings convey a subjective impression of what she saw.
Later years
By 1972, OʹKiff almost lost her sight. She could not write in oil, but she worked with coal and a pencil. Then she met a young potter, who soon became her confidant and companion. After her death in 1986, at the age of 98, her body was cremated and her ashes scattered. This seems to put an end to the story of the long life of an artist named Georgia O Kiff. The biography, however, continued, as all property was left to the companion. Relatives challenged the will, and the case was settled out of court. A museum in Santa Fe has been set up for part of its assets, and it houses all of Georgia’s O'Keeffe’s creative heritage. The text of the article is written on the basis of the English-language Wikipedia.