My Love Affair with O’Keeffe

One evening in the late 1970s when I was living in Minneapolis, I was introduced to the legendary artist Georgia O’Keeffe. Not literally of course, but through a PBS documentary I happened upon strictly by chance. My appreciation of art was quite embryonic in those days. By this stage of my post-college life, I had explored MOMA on a 1975 inaugural visit to New York City and had volunteered as a novice docent at the Walker Art Center. I had always been a top student, but one who lagged when it came to drawing and painting, the “C’s” in art on my report card a stark reminder of my limitation. But as a young adult, with individual talent or not, I decided that I could still learn to love and appreciate the creativity and beauty produced by others.

I had never heard of, let alone seen, O’Keeffe’s work before that PBS evening. However, the evolution of this iconic painter — from Wisconsin-born Art Institute of Chicago student to the gallery of famed photographer (and future husband) Alfred Stieglitz, to the flowers, landscapes, and skulls of her most iconic Southwest imagery — completely mesmerized me. I began to read about her life and artistic journey as well as to collect framed posters of her most famous paintings, the ones publicizing the current season of the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival. She was a woman so far ahead of her time that for decades, no one was completely sure how to interpret her giant flowers. Despite her unwavering denials otherwise, were these really representations of female sexuality? In the 1930’s no less? Regardless, they were nothing if not bold, beautiful, and bodacious. My infatuation grew.

By the 1980s, I had moved to Chicago and could, and did, visit O’Keeffe’s masterpieces at the Art Institute any time I wanted, including her 1965 opus, Sky Above Clouds IV . I could remember my own first plane flight and then imagine hers — and her awe in gazing down upon snowy fleece balls just below the wings. In the winter of 1981, I toured the gigantic installation artwork organized by feminist artist Judy Chicago called The Dinner Party, in which 39 historical women from Sacajawea to Emily Dickinson to Virginia Woolf were represented by elaborate embroidered place setting runners and sculpted plates. I paused carefully at each one, learning about that particular woman’s contributions to society and history. When I reached Plate #39, I was delighted to learn that it belonged to the only still-living legend seated at the table, Georgia O’Keeffe.

By this time she was 94 years old, legally blind, and living with her full-time caretaker Juan Hamilton at her long-time home in New Mexico. The beauty of her place setting, a sensuous and colorful feminine image, almost moved me to tears and stuck with me for weeks. Finally I wrote her a fan letter and mailed it to “Georgia O’Keeffe — Abiquiu, New Mexico.” It was never returned to me. In my imagination, Juan reads it to her as she relaxes in the sunny courtyard of her adobe home and studio, a letter from a young Midwestern woman who shares her delight that O’Keeffe was seated at the same dinner table as Sojourner Truth and Susan B. Anthony. In my letter, I thanked her for her courage of vision and for the achingly beautiful art that she had created, those amazing images of nature and of life and death. I ended by telling her that my own personal favorite was The Lawrence Tree (1929). By the time O’Keeffe died 5 years later at age 98, she had become the most famous and prolific woman painter in history.

The first time I visited Santa Fe in the late 80s, I knew that a trip to Abiquiu would be on the itinerary. I wanted to see for myself the extraordinary landscapes that had so inspired her for almost half a century. In those days, just a few years after her death in 1986, her home/studio was not yet a museum attraction open to the public as it is now. Nonetheless, it was a thrill just to view Lake Abiquiu and her favorite mountain Pedernal (the top of which is the final resting place for her ashes) and drive past the little post office announcing that I had arrived to Abiquiu, New Mexico. In the 25 years since, I’ve been back to Santa Fe at least a dozen times, most recently this past May when in one 24-hour period, I experienced an O’Keeffe immersion: the fabulous Santa Fe museum that houses the largest collection of her works, her Abiquiu Home and Studio, and a Landscape Tour of Ghost Ranch, the land of crimson rocks and azure skies. It felt for a minute as though we had stepped into one of her paintings; I was again struck by her extraordinary talent. She was a complete original, fearless and passionate. It gives me joy to think that there is even a small chance that she heard my words of appreciation, along with the thousands of other fan letters and accolades she surely received during her long and productive life.

Tomorrow my 8 year-old granddaughter Eve begins a 2-week children’s art camp sponsored by the Art Institute of Chicago. Eve is gifted at art and loves to draw more than anything in the world. Her mother Annika and I tell her that she will be studying at the same place where the famous Georgia O’Keeffe studied painting as a young woman 100 years ago! Eve admitted she had heard of her, but hadn’t yet seen her art, so I shared two of my books of O’Keeffe paintings with her as early inspiration. Told that O’Keeffe was the most famous woman painter in history, Eve declared with confidence, “Then I want to be as good as she was!” Regardless of the creative journey into which Eve will eventually blossom someday, my wish for her is that she will always find an unfailing courage of her own unique vision, just as O’Keeffe did a century before her. From the grandmother who herself was the “C” art student, that’s one gem of artistic wisdom that I can possibly hope to share.