Nikul Vats

Scenic Art Master Artist Georgia O' Keeffe- Americas First Famous Female Artist

While most people may not be as familiar with O'Keeffe as they are with Picasso or van Gogh, we have most certainly, at one time or another, been exposed to her work. She is most notably famous for her paintings of large, oversized flowers. Her first such painting was created in Ninteen Fourty Two and gained a good deal of buzz in the art prints world. What is also unique about O'Keeffe's work is that while she painted nature, landscapes art, bones, and city structures, not once did she venture to paint people in all her work.

Georgia O'Keeffe was and is considered one of the greatest female artists of the 20th century. Widely known as a  still-life painter O'Keeffe carved her forte near the beginning on with the help of Alfred Stieglitz and his Gallery 291. She painted natural settings at their most basic; large-scale flowers, bones and landscapes. O'Keeffe captured the raw brilliance of nature that only she could see and exposed us to its beauty.

While most people may not be as familiar with O'Keeffe as they are with Picasso or van Gogh, we have most certainly, at one time or another, been exposed to her work. She is most notably famous for her paintings of large, oversized flowers. Her first such painting was created in 1924 and gained a good deal of buzz in the art world. What is also unique about O'Keeffe's work is that while she painted nature, landscapes art, bones, and city structures, not once did she venture to paint people in all her work.

A Natural Georgia O’Keeffe Inspiration

Like any brilliant artist, Georgia O’Keefe’s imagination was sparked by a myriad of things. However, the O’Keeffe inspiration lay mainly in the natural landscapes surrounding her. The art she produced were most often related to her immediate environment and her personal life experiences. O’Keeffe’s forte was her use of perception. Many artists can paint a beautiful flower or a majestic mountain, but few can give it the realistic magnificence that O’Keeffe brought to her art. Her fine art works reflect an intense observation and appreciation for nature. The color tones in her flower paintings are impeccably blended. Because she magnified her subjects, her paintings took on an abstract art appearance.

Marriage and New York
The 1920’s were a significant time for Georgia O’Keeffe. Not only did she marry famous fine art photographer Alfred Stieglitz, but she also produced her first large-scale flower painting titled “Petunia No. 2”. During this time, she was introduced to many of Stieglitz’s modernist painter friends; the likes of Arthur Dove, Charles DeMuth, and Paul Strand are artists who affected her work profoundly.

Stieglitz frequently took Georgia to his family home in Lake George in the Adirondack Mountains where she produced many paintings of the area’s countryside. She also took to architectural art subjects, creating paintings of the New York skyscrapers that could be seen from her 30th floor balcony at the Shelton Hotel. Because O’Keeffe inspiration came basically from nature, it is interesting to speculate why she chose to paint the New York skyline. It could be argued that her painting “Radiator Building – Night” (1927) does have some seemingly natural elements. The smoke billowing on the right side of the painting resembles clouds, and the reddish stripe to the left is reminiscent of a fading sunset. Moreover, the building is reaching up toward the sky, as would a mountain. Perhaps for O’Keeffe, skyscrapers illustrated humanity’s attempt at creating nature, or its need to challenge it.

The Move to New Mexico
Toward the end of the 20’s, O’Keeffe began to tire of New York and took a trip to New Mexico. She fell in love with the landscape and returned there every year until she moved there permanently in 1946. It was a new beginning for Georgia O’Keeffe, whose inspiration abounded, once again as she took to painting the mountainous landscape and sun-bleached animal skulls that littered the desert floor. She insists that the bones depicted in her work were not indicative of death, but rather of the ever-lasting beauty of the desert itself. She revelled in the striking vegetation and vibrant colours. Once again her paintings took on a magnified quality, possibly a significant message that nature is larger than humanity, and that its splendid beauty dwarfs us. Despite artists using nature as a subject, nature will always be too much for an artist to contain.

Art Prints of Georgia O’ Keeffe

India’s online art prints website also offers fine art prints & posters by Georgia O’ Keeffe.  All these prints are available in India ranging Rs.675 to Rs.2100 only.

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