Art 2 Research blog

Brandon DeChicio
I have chosen Georgia OKeefe for my artist to research. She is considered
the mother of American modernism because of the pivotal role she played in the
modernist movement.
Georgia OKeefe was born on November 15th, 1887 in Wisconsin. She went
to school in her hometown of Sun Prairie, Wisconsin where she decided to become
an artist at age ten. Eight years later, she would attend at the School of the Art
Institute of Chicago. During her time there she decided that she could not become a
prominent artist in the art world and would not paint for another four years.
However, she was inspired to pick up the brush again in 1912 when she attended a
class at the University of Virginia and picked up the technique of using line,
shading, and color harmoniously. She would later teach art in public schools in
Amarillo, Texas and Columbia University, South Carolina. OKeeffe sent some of
her work to New York in 1915 and it was displayed in a gallery. This really started
her career as an artist. Over the following years, OKeefe would create many more
pieces including her famous pineapple bud painting when she spent nine weeks
in Hawaii. In 1929 she went to New Mexico to find a new source of inspiration.
There, she collected many objects from the vast desert such as plants, animal
bones, and old artifacts to use as models for her work. In 1935 she created
probably her most famous piece which is the Rams head and white hollyhock
piece. O, Keefe spent much of her life in New Mexico finding other subjects of the
area to paint. She loved New Mexico so much that she decided to move onto a
ranch with her husband Alfred Stieglitz, a photographer who put OKeefes work
in his gallery back in New York. She went on many camping trips with friends
around the vast landscape to find the subjects she was looking for to paint off of. In
1961, she and some photographers went on a rafting trip down the Colorado River.
On the excursion, she found many beautiful areas to include into her artwork
including canyons and cliffs. In 1971, she wrote about the canyons saying that its
like the canyons are already painted for you until you actually try to paint them,
which might indicate that it was not always easy for her to do this kind of thing.

In 1972, O, Keefe began to lose her eyesight due to macular degeneration. This
meant she stopped oil painting but still continued drawing in charcoal. She moved
to Santa Fe in 1984 where she passed away on March 6, 1986 at the age of 98. She
wished that her cremated ashes be scattered along the wind at the top of Pedernal
Mountain which was her favorited get away and subject to paint.
Georgia OKeefe left a legacy after her death in the form of movies and
museums such as the Georgia OKeefe museum in Santa Fe. Many loved her
artwork including her 1931 painting The white flower which sold for over Forty
million U.S dollars. Georgia OKeefe started out in a small Wisconsin town with
only dreams. Through times of doubt and uncertainty, OKeefe managed to live her
dreams and leave a legacy that still goes strong today.

Some of OKeefes art pieces:

Pineapple Bud, 1939
This piece was created by OKeefe after being hired by the Dole food
company to create a painting of their products to use for advertising. The painting
consists of a pineapple growing off of its flower bud and it seems rather realistic
with natural colors that you would find on a pineapple plant and strong but faded
shading. In the middle of the plant it starts off as a hot pink color and then starts to
cool into a green on the outer area. It makes me feel like I am at the desert more
than anything. This is because it looks like a cactus with its pink fruit growing off
of it. Additionally, if look at the backdrop you can see that its color resembles that
of sands in Arizona or Nevada. The medium applied is thick brush strokes but
faded down to make the texture appear lighter.

Rams head, 1935

This is another oil painting consisting of a desert mountain

backdrop and a skeletal rams head in the foreground. There is also a
white hollyhock flower that accompanies the rams skull to the left. The
colors are also natural in this like the bone color of the skull and the
coloring of the brown/orange mountain terrain. The painting makes me
feel left in the dark on why the rams head appears to be levitating along
with the white flower. Is it something spiritual or is it just her style of
depicting the landscape around her? The medium she uses is a medium
stroke and tries to make more natural and organic lines.