Georgia O'Keefe--True to Herself

My first look at a female artist is Georgia O’Keefe. I have included her even though she was a painter and not a photographer, because she has always been a tremendous influence in my work.

Her wonderful sense of composition was clean and elegant. Her use of color was almost musical. I can only say that when I look at certain of her pieces my heart sings. I also feel an affinity for her way of framing a scene. In fact, while reading her bio on the website of the New Mexico Office of the State Historian, I came across this: “Her paintings often used the framing and foreshortening that the photographer employed with the lens, and in the dark room. Her paintings, of huge flowers or bleached bones, cropped in unusual ways, mirrored the photographer’s gaze.”

    I saw an exhibit last year at the Georgia O’Keefe Museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico, called “Georgia O'Keeffe and Ansel Adams: Natural Affinities”. It was fascinating to see the similarities between her work and Ansel Adams photographs. I found a video on YouTube about this exhibit that is worth watching.

Not only was she good friends with Ansel Adams, but she was married to Alfred Stieglitz, a pioneer in American modernist photography. There are many good biographies out there about her life so I won’t go into those details here, but my take away from her story is admiration for her wisdom and knowledge of her own needs. She was able to hear the voices inside herself and stay true to her art. She was determined to create good work and have it be judged by it’s own merits and not on the basis of her gender. She had the courage to take risks and do what she needed to do.

"To create one's own world in any of the arts takes courage."                 ---Georgia O'Keefe

   

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