Fun
Georgia O’Keeffe (Living Modern)
Dear Ann,
There is an exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum right now that I haven’t yet seen and only recently heard friends buzzing about. Georgia O’Keeffe: Living Modern combines Georgia O’Keeffe’s art, iconic photographs of her by famous photographers (including her husband Alfred Stieglitz) and—most intriguing—her actual clothes. She was quite a dresser. Her clothes had a stripped-down elegance but did not omit ornamental details. She made many of her own clothes. (O’Keeffe Made May!)
I can’t wait to get there (the exhibit closes on July 23).
In the meantime, there is the video up top. There is also this NPR podcast review of the first volume of letters between Georgia O’Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz.
Enjoy!
Love,
Kay
Even before I watch the video, just saying this is an exhibit I would love to see, probably more than once. O’K’s wardrobe has long been an intriguing mystery to me.
The inevitable question after seeing her clothes: WWGK? What would Georgia O’Keeffe knit?
Excellent question.
I hope this exhibit comes up to Toronto. It is fascinating.
There’s a beautiful, large companion book of the same name that I have just returned to the library after renewing several times. Available on Amazon.
The exhibit travels to Winston-Salem NC in mid-August and then shows at the Peabody Museum in Salem MA starting in mid-December. The book accompanying the exhibit is fabulous and available on Amazon.
Thank you! Important info for those of us who can’t just hop a flight to NY right away.
Woooooow. Hope you make it to the exhibit and give us more. I’m intrigued. Off to search for the book.
Interesting. And she seems never to have smiled.
I saw this exhibit in Brooklyn at Christmas, and was most fascinated by the clothes. The ACTUAL FLAT-BRIMMED BLACK HAT! The ACTUAL BLACK CAPE! (She wore a lot of capes.) The clothes really are elegant in their simplicity; she wore almost exclusively black or cream-color, and she had a real sense of how a fabric would behave. Also, she was small. Totally fascinating and wonderful (though my 8-year old and 4-year old grandsons found it boring).
I wish I had read “Georgia: A Novel of Georgia O’Keefe” by Dawn Tripp before I saw the exhibit. It is a NOVEL, so the author obviously took some liberties in re-creating conversations, etc. Much of it is about her relationship with Stieglitz and about how the photos of her that he took (especially the nudes) affected the way her art was received by the (mostly male, of course) critics. A very feminist novel, and a cautionary tale. Had I read it first, I would have paid a lot more attention to the photos in the exhibit.
Oops, just watched the video and realized I must have seen it in March when visiting family, not at Christmas. Anyway, the main comment I wanted to add to mine above is that while you’re there, you can also see Judy Chicago’s “The Dinner Party,” which is just as breathtaking as when I first saw it in the 80s. Now THAT is a true piece of feminist art! Don’t miss it!
It’s coming soon to Salem! I CANNOT WAIT.
As someone in the film said, seeing the clothes together with the paintings is a revelation. Thanks for showing us this.
One more facet of O’Keeffe. Amazing what one can learn about via a daily visit to MDK–but ladies, you did not promote World Wide Knitting In Public Day!!! (Did you?) Which was today, I just learned from the BBC. I accidentally participated, having taken a swatch to a pit firing event for a pottery class–something to do while we waiting for the pots to be fired.
Will definitely have to look this exhibit up or the book. I was able to do a 2-day marathon of NYC museum visits in December, including a number of fashion/textile exhibits. The FIT museum is always a good place to visit. It’s free and has evening hours several days which is great if one is catching a train after a day in the city. They have several exhibitions during the year.
I love Georgia O’Keeffe, her art, she is also my aunt! Her youngest sister Claudia Ruth O’Keeffe-Windsor my mom!
Georgia O’Keeffe great artist she is also my aunt! My mom is her youngest sister Claudia Ruth O’Keeffe-Windsor
Just visited Ghost Ranch where we took a walking/hiking tour of sites on the property that Georgia O’Keefe painted. The guide brings exhibit books and describes how she figured out the matches. It is absolutely incredible! Paintings of what look like huge mountains are very small hills! The most unbelievable thing is how little the land has changed – trees are larger or have fallen over but are clearly recognizable as the exact places and trees she painted in the 1930s-50s. Unfortunately her house at Ghost Ranch is not open to the public, but the guide discusses it from 100 yards away. And they are finding more painting sites regularly so the tour changes over time.
Damn. Why didn’t this exhibition occur 2003 – 2012, when Elder Son was going to school in NYC and I could have had an excuse to fly out there and see it?
will have to find a way, a time, a place to see this. for now the book will have to do.