O'Keeffe In The Adirondacks

While Georgia O’Keeffe is most famous for her paintings of large, bright flowers and southwest landscapes, she also produced many pieces inspired by the Adirondacks. Her time in the park was an integral part in the development of her style. Like many painters before her, O’Keeffe spent multiple summers in the park, specifically on Lake George, analyzing the color and shapes of her surroundings. But contrary to many of the artist’s before her, O’Keeffe focuses less on the realistic and precise detail, and more on color and abstract forms.

            At the height of the American modernism movement, O’Keeffe developed her style while spending summers on Lake George from 1918 till 1929. Here is where she first started producing the large flowers, which are one of her most prominent contributions. These flowers are a playful and in depth analysis of the subtle hue changes in the petals and leaves. O’Keeffe played with changes in scale and the relationship between abstraction and detail. While in the Adirondacks, O’Keeffe also produced many landscape and farmscape paintings. Again, these paintings focus less on the detail of the landscape and more on the relationship between colors and shapes. This style is incredibly different from many of the paintings of the Adirondacks that were produced by artists of the Hudson River School and American Pre-Raphaelite Movement. These earlier artists valued incredible detail and precision in their work. O’Keeffe on the other hand produced paintings full of colorful exploration and personal expression.

            While her paintings inspired by the Adirondack’s may not be well known, they represent an important period in O’Keeffe’s artistic development. For centuries, artists have helped develop a narrative of the park that is represented in many styles.  Many artists have used the inspiration of the mountains and lakes in the Adirondacks to help develop their style and find their artistic voice. O’Keeffe’s work was an important development in the American modernist movement and her Lake George inspired paintings are not only an ode to her appreciation of the mountainous park, but also a larger testament to the power of the American landscape.

Lake George, 1922, oil on canvas, 16 ¼ x 22 in., San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Gift of Charlotte Mack (image © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum/Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York)

From the Lake, No. 3, 1924, Oil on canvas, 36 x 30 in. Philadelphia Museum of Art: Bequest of Georgia O’Keeffe for the Alfred Stieglitz Collection, 1987 (image © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York)

           

Sources:

Patricia C. F. Mandel, Fair Wilderness: American Paintings in the Collection of The Adirondack Museum

http://www.afanews.com/articles/item/1860-modern-nature-georgia-okeeffe-and-lake-george

http://www.sullivangoss.com/georgia_OKeeffe/#An Analysis of the Artist's Work