GEORGIA O’KEEFFE

Those with a liking for American modern art will want to know about the latest retrospective at the Tate Modern, London.

This features more than 100 paintings and drawings from the 2,000 plus produced by artist and American icon Georgia O’Keeffe (1897-1986) and is spread across 13 rooms in the gallery. Here are some examples of her huge canvasses of flower pictures, some of which critics said were depictions of female body parts. (“Black Iris lll” from 1926 being one obvious example – not shown) Nude photographs of O’Keeffe taken and published by her mentor, lover and then husband, New York photographer Alfred Stieglitz didn’t help her denials that there was anything sexual in her work, and she always hated the interpretation, declaring “When people read erotic symbols into my paintings they’re really talking about their own affairs”.

As well as her much-admired flower paintings O’Keeffe produced some striking New York cityscapes, some colourful landscapes of nearby Lake George where she spent many summers with Stieglitz, as well as of the rugged countryside of New Mexico, and the animal bones she found there, where she happily spent so many of her last years. One appreciative visitor to the Tate told us “Georgia O’Keeffe’s approach to art was fascinating. She was obviously driven and dedicated to exploring her techniques and use of colours. I loved the flower paintings displayed and was impressed to see the way that she took her environment and made a series of pictures of simple things like the black and white rocks and the desert valley”.

The exhibition runs until October 30 2016.

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