Georgia O Keeeffe's Early Masterpieces

Georgia Totto O'Keeffe was born on November 15, 1887, in Sun Prarie, Wisconsin. Her father was an Irishman named Francis O’Keefe and her mother, Ida Totto was of Dutch and Hungarian descent. Of their seven children, Georgia was the oldest girl. Finding her passion for art at a very early age, Georgia would frequently paint and draw as a child. After completing high school, she attended The Art Institute of Chicago and studied under John Vanderpoel. Her time at the Art Institute was brief after becoming ill with typhoid fever. After recovering from her illness, she decides to attend the Art Students League in New York in 1907. Not long into her studies, she's awarded the Art League’s, Still Life Scholarship. In 1915, Georgia O’Keeffe asserted
A favorite flower of hers, she began painting the Black Iris with oil on canvas in 1926. By enlarging the petals beyond life-size proportions, she would draw the viewers attention to the small details, such as the soft, natural curves and textures, that might otherwise be overlooked on a flower. O'Keeffe beautifully gradates the colors from deep black purples in the center to delicate pinks, grays, and whites on the outer edges. The center of the painting catches the eye instantaneously. The small, circular black hole is surrounded by slightly lighter hues of purple and naturally, opens up into the petal below. By looking deeper into the flower, it is possible to see one single vein running from the center, downward into the petal. The flower perfectly blends into the background around the edges. There isn't much space in the painting that isn't used by the flower, and the backdrop is very neutral in color. Georgia O’Keeffe is thought by many to have spearheaded the feminist art movement through her work. Her flower images, including this one, often received interpretations from feminist critics, who saw these paintings as veiled illusions to the female