Georgia O’Keeffe’s “My New Yorks” at the High Museum
Georgia O’Keeffe was born in Wisconsin on November 15, 1887. She was a talented modernist painter and draftswoman who studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and worked as a commercial illustrator and teacher. She developed her own unique style and came to be called the “Mother of American Modernism”.
Photograph of Georgia O’Keeffe in 1918 by Alfred Stieglitz.
Alfred Stieglitz, an art dealer and photographer, exhibited O’Keeffe’s works in 1917. He invited O’Keeffe to move to New York and focus on her work as an artist. O’Keeffe moved to New York in 1918 and developed a relationship that led to her marriage to Stieglitz in December of 1924.
In 1924, Georgia O’Keeffe and her husband Alfred Stieglitz, moved into the Shelton Hotel for a month starting in November. The Shelton Hotel was the world’s tallest residential tower and the first to allow residential living above the eleventh floor. It offered a new perspective from high above the city that inspired O’Keeffe.
Photos of Georgia O’Keeffe by Alfred Stieglitz taking between 1918 and 1921.
O’Keeffe and Stieglitz returned to the Shelton Hotel in November of 1925 for the winter and stayed from late autumn until spring in the following years. By 1927, they were staying on the 30th floor with an east-facing view.
They spent summers at the Stieglitz family home at Lake George in upstate New York. O’Keeffe painted view and subjects in both locations and called her collection “My New Yorks”.
A drawing of the Shelton Hotel by Hugh Ferris in The Metropolis of Tomorrow.
The Shelton Hotel, at 525 Lexington Avenue, was designed by architect Arthur Loomis Harmon. The 34-story building rises 384 feet and was constructed from 1922 to 1923. James T. Lee was the developer - the grandfather of First Lady Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis.
As the building rises, it steps back from the street to comply with the relatively new 1916 Zoning Resolution - among the first zoning ordinances in the Unites States adopted following public shock and outcry over the size of the Equitable Building in downtown Manhattan.
The building was constructed as an apartment hotel: an apartment complex that uses a booking system like a hotel. It featured amenities like a clubhouse, gymnasium, bowling alley, Turkish baths, swimming pool, barber and billiard tables.
The Shelton with Sunspots, New York, 1926 by Georgia O’Keeffe
The Shelton Hotel and the surrounding, towering buildings being erected seem to have fascinated O’Keeffe. She painted a series of works from the perspective of a pedestrian making her way among the tall buildings.
These images don’t do her paintings justice. You have to see them in person to appreciate the subtly of her work, especially the blended colors like those you see in the bottom half of the image above.
Three studies of a view of the East River by Georgia O’Keeffe.
The painting on the left above is our most favorite of the exhibition at the High Museum. It’s a dark cityscape in the foreground looking across the East River - the river that flows down the east side of the island of Manhattan. O’Keeffe’s expression of light, particularly on the water, shows she studied the scene carefully.
East River from the 30th Story of the Shelton Hotel, New York, 1928 by Georgia O’Keeffe
O’Keeffe’s studies of the East River prepared her to paint the piece above. This painting shows off her ability as a draftswoman. As architects, we’re trained to draw in perspective so we notice when painters don’t get perspective correct… particularly when laying out and then painting buildings.
In this case, O’Keeffe does an excellent job drawing the buildings in the foreground with a vanishing point off to left center. She carefully uses light colors to create texture and a few reflections of light on the tops of the buildings in the foreground.
She blends blues and greys in the water of the river and abstracts the buildings in the background so we don’t have to work too hard to discern what’s across the river. She’s painted the scene as we would see it - details of elements close to the viewer are clear while that level of detail is lost as the scene stretches to the horizon.
From the Lake No. 1, Lake George, 1924 by Georgia O’Keeffe
Georgia O’Keeffe painted what she saw. Splitting her time between Manhattan and the Stieglitz house in Lake George resulted in a series of urban landscapes from her time in Manhattan and a series of rural studies that included paintings of lake, shells, farm buildings, etc. from her time in Lake George.
The piece above is doesn’t contain any elements that are explicit representations. It’s an abstract that leaves the viewer to ponder what might be represented while also appreciating O’Keeffe’s skill in creating flowing, organic shapes brought to life with vivid colors.
In Conclusion
Georgia O’Keeffe was elected to the American Academy of Arts & Letters, she received multiple honorary degrees from prestigious universities, she was presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom (the highest honor awarded to American civilians) and the National Medal of Arts in the course of her career spanning seven decades. While the exhibition at the High Museum spans about five of her seventy years, it’s still interesting to think that one could travel to Manhattan and visit the building that captivated O’Keeffe during her stays in Manhattan.
Architecture is often a bridge between generations and time periods. We’re fortunate some buildings endure to remind us of that connection.
While Manhattan has changed significantly since Georgia O’Keeffe was a resident, we could still retrace her footsteps. The exhibition helps us do that with a map showing some of the locations O’Keeffe painted while she lived in Manhattan.
Leave a comment below to let us know if you were aware of O’Keeffe’s stays in Manhattan (or Lake George) and the paintings she produced. Do you have a favorite?
The “My New Yorks” exhibition at the High Museum closes on February 16, 2025.
Other Posts of Interest:
Architecture of the Last Colony Book Launch
Gift Idea: American Classicist
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