“No work has art-value unless it reflects the personality of the author.”

         Arthur Wesley Dow, American painter, artist, and teacher.

 

Dow’s perspective on art is centered in humanizing the artist. His approach prioritized the artists’ interpretation of their subject. He claimed that when it comes to art “the most important thing…is beauty.” During his time as art director at Teachers College, Columbia University, he would have crossed paths with artist Georgia O’Keeffe. It was there that O’Keeffe studied to achieve an additional teaching certification.¹ However, she wouldn’t expect that meeting the director would have a profound effect on her artwork.

        “My New Yorks” was curated by the Art Institute’s Sarah Kelly Oehler and Annelise K. Madse. The collection of paintings and works range from tall skyscrapers in New York City to the barren wastelands of New Mexico. In the mid-to-late 1920s, O’Keeffe was traveling considerably between these two places. The city and the desert are two drastically different environments. Cities are packed with people, loud, and full of technology. The desert is desolate, lonely, and antiquated. Although these two environments are complete opposites in nature, “My New Yorks” melds them together, showcasing various parts of what is arguably the most vulnerable time in O’Keeffe’s life.

 

        In 1918, O’Keeffe and her later-to-be husband, Alfred Stieglitz, made an official move to New York City. But it’s through work created in the midst of the mid-to-late 1920s that viewers get a unique scope of her life. This exhibition features some specific works from that time period that are defining for O’Keeffe’s career—not based on success, but more importantly, on the vulnerability of her artistic expression. O’Keeffe may be most known for her florals. Light Iris shows a close-up view of the blue and purple flower. The abstract piece was often analyzed to be suggestive: “detailing with unprecedented frankness a staggering array of erotic preoccupations.”2 Similarly, Flower Abstraction depicts a flower close up. This painting “suggests the immensity of nature.”3

        However, there is a hidden vulnerability and perspective in the history of the cityscapes. The move to the big city proved to be a valiant, but conquerable feat. The cityscapes reflect O’Keeffe’s inclination to solitary life. She would often walk around the city and draw the buildings she saw, painting them later. She would describe these walks as “a way to see something” and that “I had a very good time all by myself.”

 

        Her first painting of the city, New York Street with Moon is framed by the distinct lines of copper-black buildings. It looks as though O’Keeffe stopped on the sidewalk and craned her neck up towards the sky. Besides the dark buildings, she embellishes the streetlight in front of her, the one illuminating her view, with a halo-shaped glow. The other source of light, the moon, sits in a cushion of clouds. In the distance, the orange hue of the sky shows remnants of dusk. The juxtaposition of the colorful sky and the darker buildings may symbolize the way O’Keeffe sees nature and the man-made buildings of NYC. Although they are opposing forces, they are forced to coexist. This theme plays into the rest of O’Keeffe’s city works.

        The artistic change from the floral depictions to cityscapes saw a lot of conflicting feedback. Originally, New York Street with Moon was to be hung at Alfred Stieglitz’s gallery, Anderson Galleries, in 1925. However, Stieglitz refused to hang the painting. Stieglitz argued that “even men found it difficult to paint New York” and preferred her “feminine, large-scale flower paintings.”4 It wasn’t until a solo exhibition the following year that New York Street with Moon was hung. “It sold on the very first day of the show,” O’Keeffe recounted. “From then on they let me paint New York.”

        The trouble O’Keeffe was experiencing was the pressure to live up to people’s expectations of her. Critic and writer Henry McBride probed at her change from the “emotional” to the “not.” The notion that her city works were not “emotional” was simply false. O’Keeffe claims: “One can’t paint New York as it is, but rather as it is felt.” She follows the teachings of Dow, especially in these works.

 

        O’Keeffe continues the “non-emotional” era of her career with East River from the Shelton. O’Keeffe and Stieglitz moved into the Shelton Hotel around 1925 after moving various times in the early 1920s. East River from the Shelton shows the city through O’Keeffe’s lens. In the foreground of the piece is a near-silhouette of the city. The middle ground is of the East River—red reflections from the sun glimmers in the water. In the distance, is the brown city. Above it all is the beating sun with streaks and spots dancing in the blue afternoon sky. It is a divine-like figure that casts light and shadows upon the city. It illuminates the various colors of the water and darkens the backs of buildings.

        East River blends nature and the city together once again. The streaks in the sun and the red hues in the river show just how O’Keeffe “sees” New York City. The expression and the colors of the natural elements of the painting argue that the true beauty of NYC is the nature found within it. She manages to find the life in the bleak city life. In some of her grittiest and grayest paintings, she still incorporates the beauty of nature.

 

        The dull gray city buildings are seen in various “Sheltons” she painted during her time in NYC. Many of the paintings of the “Shelton,” including The Shelton with Sunspots, N.Y., continue to incorporate the gritty city with bright elements of nature. As exciting and new as these works were, The Sheltons gave O’Keeffe a lot of grief. Many of the paintings of the hotel were destroyed by her own hand. The reason why is still uncertain, but it’s hard not to believe that the pressure of public response had something to do with the destruction of some of her “Sheltons.”

        The paintings of New York City are a creative departure from what Georgia O’Keeffe is known for. The city was reserved for men; it was seen as unemotional. Stieglitz wanted to stop her from painting the city. As a result, Georgia O’Keeffe was put in a box by the critics and men around her. But she was able to break out of the constraints as she found herself in those solitary walks in the city. What was brought to life were these intimate depictions of the city. She found the beauty and life hidden in the concrete jungle–she found herself.

Footnotes

1 Cathy Curtis, “The Shape of Dow’s Influence : Painter Who Had Impact on O’Keeffe Is the Subject of Exhibit, Lecture”, LA Times. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-07-13-ca-2005-story.html

2 “Light Iris, 1924 by Georgia O’Keeffe”, Georgiaokeeffe.net, https://www.georgiaokeeffe.net/light-iris.jsp

3 “Georgia O’Keeffe, Flower Abstraction, 1924”, Whitney.org, https://whitney.org/collection/works/984

4 “Georgia O’Keeffe, New York Street with Moon, 1925”, www.museothyssen.org, Andrew Hart Benson (they/them/theirs) is a writer for the New Art Examiner. They have a degree in Communication from SUNY University at Buffalo.