Georgia O'Keeffe: 7 works

'She used the twin arches and harp-like cables of the bridge to create a valentine to the things she was leaving behind, saying goodbye to Stieglitz, their partnership, and the city where they launched their careers. The bridge is also a gateway, perhaps her metaphor for leaving the manmade city of stone and steel for the clear blue skies of New Mexico.'

'As this pioneer of American Modernism approached all of her subjects, whether buildings or flowers, landscapes or bones, here O'Keeffe magnified shapes and simplified details to underscore their essential beauty. She painted the cross just as she saw it: "big and strong, put together with wooden pegs," and behind it, "those hills ... (that) go on and on--it was like looking at two miles of gray elephants."'

'She revisited New Mexico in 1930 and every year until 1949, when she settled there.'

'During a summer of painting in New Mexico in 1929, Georgia O'Keeffe became fascinated with the landscape.'

'In "Cow's Skull with Calico Roses," O'Keeffe added a macabre note by decorating the skull with artificial flowers, the kind used to adorn graves in New Mexico.'

'As O'Keeffe wrote, "One cannot be an American by going about saying that one is an American.'

'Most dramatically, O'Keeffe broke with her optical experience of this scene and drenched the canvas with deep yellows and reds.'