Georgia O'Keeffe and New Mexico: A Sense of Place

by Barbara Buhler Lynes, Lesley Poling-Kempes, Frederick W. Turner

When Georgia O'Keeffe first visited New Mexico in 1917, she was instantly drawn to the stark beauty of its unusual architectural and landscape forms. In 1929, she began spending part of almost every year painting there, first in Taos, and subsequently in and around Alcalde, Abiquiu, and Ghost Ranch, with occasional excursions to remote sites she found particularly compelling. Georgia O'Keeffe and New Mexico is the first book to analyze the artist's famous depictions of these Southwestern landscapes.


Beautifully illustrated and gracefully written, the book accompanies an exhibition of the same name at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico. It reproduces the exhibition's 50 paintings and includes striking photographs of the sites that inspired them as well as diagrams of the region's distinctive geology. The book examines the magnificence of O'Keeffe's work through essays by three noted authors. Barbara Buhler Lynes, Curator of the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum and organizer of the exhibition, discusses the relationship of the artist's paintings to the places that inspired her.


Frederick Turner offers an illuminating essay contrasting O'Keeffe's fabled aloofness from the well-established art colony in Santa Fe with her intense closeness to the local landscape she so fiercely loved. Lesley Poling-Kempes furnishes a fascinating chronicle of O'Keeffe's years in the region as well as a useful explanation of the geological forces that produced the intense colors and dramatic shapes of the landscapes O'Keeffe painted.




EXHIBIT SCHEDULE:
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Georgia O'Keeffe Museum

Santa Fe, New Mexico
June 11-September 12, 2004



Columbus Museum of Art

Columbus, Ohio
October 1, 2004-January 16, 2005



Albright-Knox Art Gallery

Buffalo, New York
January 28-May 08, 2005

Genres: Art, Nonfiction, Biography, Photography

144 pages, Hardcover

First published May 4, 2004

Reviews

[Leanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't consider myself a big O'Keeffe fan but a recent article by Morgan Meis in Image Magazine called "From the Faraway Nearby really captured my attention. In trying to illuminate how OKeefe's project was so fundamentally different from the macro images of her photographer husband, Meis says: But the insinuation that O’Keeffe was simply copying Stieglitz and Strand’s photographic close-ups in the medium of paint misses the whole problem that O’Keeffe was trying to solve. She was, to overstate the obvious, interested in paint. She wanted to make paintings. The power of a painting is that it can, potentially, render a picture of a thing being looked at that shows how the thing is transformed by the looking. Photography sets up a different dynamic, precisely because the photographer, in creating an image, must contend with a second, mechanical eye, the eye of the camera itself.

O’Keeffe’s close-ups, if we can call them that, do not quite have the look of close-up photographs. Even the iconic flower pictures, pictures that come closest, have an entirely different feel to them, difficult to describe but impossible not to see. A painting like Jimson Weed from 1936, for instance, is on the face of it an extremely realistic detailing of four jimson weed blossoms. But you’d never mistake it for a photograph. Why not? Maybe it’s the resonance between the curvy lines in the blossoms and the veins on the leaves in the background. And the deep background of the painting, while vaguely sky-like in its soft blue color, is something not quite of this world. Or look at the leaves in the top left of the painting. O’Keeffe has played with the lines of darker and lighter green to the point where the painting almost reads as a landscape. The overall effect is psychedelic, not obviously at first, a subtle psychedelia, but one that becomes more assertive as you look."

With this mind, I approached Lyne's GORGEOUS book with great interest.

Architectural Digest has a slideshow here of some of the photographs but what was so incredible about Lyne's book is the way she put the photos in context of OKeefe's paintings and life history.

Why are there two homes and did OKeeffe have a different vision for each--this is something that is not clear. Since she divides her time by season, I am imagining it was a weather related decision when to move back and forth. Both homes are jaw-droppingly beautiful and reading the text and looking at the reproductions of her paintings, along with photographs taken by great photographers like her husband or Karsh or Ansel Adams, I started to realize how her vision was so much greater than the paintings--it was a style of living life--of clothes and food, of gardening and design. An all-encompassing way to see the world. Her clothing was really interesting to think about. Just wow!

[Natalie Park · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars. Beautiful coffee table book that looks at the landscapes that inspired O’Keeffe. There are the actual landscape photos and the art that was inspired by them with more information written by the director of the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum.

[Patrick Gibson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The exhibit originated at the O’Keeffe museum—the best thing to come out of the place (I am not a friend). There are endless books on O’Keeffe but this one does something a little different. A few years ago the exact locations of about 25 of her landscapes were located and photographed. More astounding, the fact these places hadn’t changed in thirty or forty years, this stereoscopic view gives us mortals a chance to see how the painting goddess altered the mundane into the mystical. Never has genius been so revelatory. You can ignore the text. This parallel universe speaks for itself.

[Cheryl]

Pretty pictures. Nifty idea to compare photographs to paintings of same landscape. Enlightening the changes the artist made. Note, for example, the shadows showing light from different directions simultaneously, in 'Cedar Tree with Lavender Hills.'

Lightly skimmed May 2025.

[Karyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book puts O'Keeffe's paintings side-by-side with photographs of the landscapes she painted--in most cases, the photographer managed to capture the landscape from the same angle and in the same light as O'Keeffe's paintings. This book shows how the New Mexico landscape endures, and adds depth to ideas about how O'Keeffe captured that landscape in her work.

[Luke Owen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this very informative and well-written. The concepts discussed were coherent to someone like me who does not have a deep knowledge of visual art. I also never felt talked down to or that anything had been dumbed down.

I do wish that the analyses of O'Keeffe's pieces in relation to their inspirations had continued throughout the book. The latter half dips into a tangential narrative that I found somewhat irrelevant. Albeit, I suppose speculation is bound to be found in any sort of biography, retrospective, or analysis. I perhaps just have issues with anything that even slightly reeks of the desperate, pathetic, self-insertive "What about me?" mentality. That being said, the latter section was not entirely abhorrent.

Overall, I would highly recommend this to anyone interested at all in Georgia O'Keeffe's work, especially if you're interested in her New Mexico landscapes.

[Annie · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you have spent any time in the American Southwest, these landscapes feel familiar. The shades of pink and green, the dramatic mesas and rolling hills- I turned page after page and was gripped by the irrational feeling that I had been to these locations before. I could see them as vividly in my mind as before me on the page.

I gave this to Christian for Christmas two and a half years ago, but only just read it now. Sometimes books will find you when you need them. This was a balm.

[Ginger · Rating 5 out of 5]

The depiction of multiple landscape paintings of specific sites in O'Keeffe's favorite area in New Mexico are linked to the corresponding colored photograph as well as detailed descriptions of her various interpretations. Her artistic development and personal life augment the story of Ahiquiu, Alcalde, and Ghost Ranch as her sense of place, concluding with speculation about her choice of isolation.

[Harry Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting to see a side by side comparison of some of her paintings from New Mexico with corresponding photos. It's easy to see her capture the gastalt of a location.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eaasays comparing and commenting on specific paintings compared to photographs of the sites that O'Keeffe painted.

[Susan Gemperline · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book contained many photos of paintings I had not seen before. The author relates O'Keefe's paintings to photos of the same sites in New Mexico, discussing how O'Keefe changed the scene to suit her reaction to the site. It was an interesting way to view Georgia O'Keefe's paintings and yet, as an artist, I wonder if Georgia was that logical in thinking. I suggest that her artistic brain was sensing its way through those changes she made to her landscape paintings. I don't know. Maybe the author knew her well enough to say.

[Meredith Reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked up this book at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe and I'm glad I did. Searching for the locations depicted in the artwork is something I would have liked to do and having photographs of the hills and mountains to compare with the paintings is delightful. Having seen some of the paintings in person makes the experience even better.

This book has inspired me to find and read another book about Georgia O'Keeffe.

[Annette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having just visited the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, we were searching for books related to her artwork. This book is unique because it helps readers see the connection between the artwork and the places that inspired the works. It's fascinating to compare the paintings with photographs of the locations.

[Melinda · Rating 4 out of 5]

More gorgeous art by one of our greatest modern painters. I found the curator's essay interesting, especially the idea O'Keeffe, through manipulations, created these landscapes as abstractions, a continuation of her earlier work in Texas and South Carolina. I'm waiting for a biography to arrive in the mail and anxious to read more.

[Mckinley · Rating 4 out of 5]

her work focusing on landscapes of New Mexico

[Judith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good overview of O'Keeffe in New Mexico with lots of photos and pictures of her paintings