Georgia O'Keeffe - Wonderful Woman No. 56

Georgia O'Keeffe - 1887-1986
American Artist

Added to the album by a wonderful man called Gavin

When writing about Frida Kahlo (Wonderful Woman No. 37 - http://iamawonderfulwoman.blogspot.com/2012/02/frida-kahlo-wonderful-woman-no-37.html), I touched on the subject of lack of recognition for female artists. Georgia O'Keeffe is one female artist who broke the mould. From reasonably early in her career, Georgia was heralded as one of America's most influential artists. She received critical acclaim and impressive payments for her work both during her lifetime and in the years since.

Much of her work is abstract and she uses the style of Native American Indians in many paintings. She has worked in charcoal, pastel, oil and watercolour. Most famously using the landscape of the United States as her inspiration, depicting both the natural and the man-made aspects of her home nation. Georgia focused on still-life paintings and taking a still-life image and making it abstract. Much of her work is quite sensual and many painting are believed to symbolise women and female genitalia - this making her hugely popular with the feminist movement.

She lived in New York City from 1918 with her lover (and later husband), fellow artist, Alfred Stieglitz. The bohemian two worked on individual art projects and Alfred used Georgia as a photographic muse. He pictured her extensively, both erotically and in order to capture her moods, character and beauty, sometimes taking close-up shots of parts of her body, particularly her hands.

Personality was crucial to these photographs; it was this, as much as her body, that Stieglitz was recording.
Roxanna Robinson, Biographer

Much of her work remains with The Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, United States of America. Georgia had a great love and respect for her country and wanted her work to remain accessible to it's people... a love and respect that was mutual, Georgia still considered one of the country's most wonderful artists.

And considered here as one of the world's very wonderful women.

I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn't say any other way - things I had no words for.
Georgia O'Keeffe