Oddly rendered in abstract, cubist forms, O’Keeffe’s Manhattan (1932) is a transitional work in the artist’s canon. Painted as a commission for a mural proposal exhibition, Manhattan features elements unusual for the artist at the time: a sublimely large canvas, a sense of geometric minimalism, a series of floating peonies and calico roses which intriguingly contrast with the skyscraper theme of the painting. A formal and visual analysis of Manhattan suggests that its unusual composition acts as a precursor to works of 1950’s Abstract Expressionism like Pollock’s Ritual and Kline’s Black Reflections. Endogenous to the painting, issues of gender and woman-as-pioneer are addressed using flowers to feminize the theme of the skyscraper, considered a masculine subject in O’Keeffe’s time. Alternative readings to the established triumph of gender include that of personal transformation and of the skyscraper as a relic of the naïve optimism of the gilded age. By echoing the color palette and composition of animal skull works like Cow’s Skull with Calico Roses, O’Keeffe established a parallel between the mystical and animistic qualities of animal bones and the otherworldly quality of the skyscraper as an awe-inspiring monolith of progress. Experimentations with arrangement also suggest the skyscraper and its ideals are dormant rather than dead, “coming to life” despite the dark circumstances which surround the nation. Thus, an analysis of Manhattan can further clarify the development of Abstract Expressionism as well as the themes underlying American modern art in the 1930s and O’Keeffe’s artistic and personal transformation.
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Georgia O’Keeffe, Abstract Expressionism, American Cubism, Skyscrapers, Great Depression, American Modern Art, Interwar Period
1. Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of Georgia O’Keeffe’s Manhattan
In “Who Will Paint New York?” art historian Anna Chave (1991) described Georgia O’Keeffe’s Manhattan (1932)as “a failed but telling experiment in embracing cubism”
[1]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, Manhattan. [Art]. Smithsonian American Art Museum, 1932.
[2]
A. Chave, "Who Will Paint New York? ‘The World's New Art Center’ and the Skyscraper Paintings of Georgia O'Keeffe," American Art, vol. 5, no. 1/2, pp. 86-107, 1991.
[1, 2]
. At eighty-four by forty-eight inches, Manhattan stands as one of O’Keeffe’s largest paintings of New York (Figure 1). Designed for an exhibition by the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Murals by American Painters and Photographers O’Keeffe’s Manhattan departs from usual renditions of the New York skyline, the vivacious color scheme hinting at her artistic reawakening at Abiquiu. Before submitting her mural proposal, O’Keeffe had expressed a desire to “paint something from a particular place and paint it big” [italics added]
[4]
W. M. Corn, "Painting Big -- O'Keeffe's Manhattan," American Art, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 22-25, 2006.
[4]
. O’Keeffe had long been “painting it big”: her floral paintings from the 1920s view the most delicate elements in nature through a macroscopic lens. About her flower paintings, O’Keeffe once said: “I'll paint what I see - what the flower is to me [sic] but I'll paint it big and they will be surprised into taking time to look at it - I will make even busy New Yorkers take time to see what I see of flowers”. Fueled by expansive vistas of a New Mexican landscape, O’Keeffe’s desire to “paint it big” found purpose in a mural.
Accordingly, O’Keeffe’s canvases grew larger as a reflection of her ambition. In 1931, she painted Back of Marie’s No. 4, a rugged New Mexican landscape set on a canvas of sixteen by thirty inches
[6]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, Back of Marie's No. 4. [Art]. Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, 1931.
[6]
. The largesse of the painting conveys a similar sense of awe explored in Radiator Building – Night, New York
[7]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, Radiator Building -- Night, New York. [Art]. Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, 1927.
Figure 1. Georgia O’Keeffe, Manhattan, 1932, Oil on canvas, 84 x 48 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D. C. Source: Smithsonian Institute.
2. Conquering the Male Skyscraper
What Chave describes as an “awkward work” may be, in fact, an intentional assertion of O’Keeffe’s female perspective over the male-dominated subject of skyscraper painting. According to art historian Wanda Corn, “the feminine, whether in men or in women, was a separate sphere in second-circle dynamics”
[8]
W. M. Corn, The Great American Thing: Modern Art and National Identity, 1915-1935, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.
[8]
. In the early 20th century modern era, women artists were still expected to adhere to watercolors or paintings of flowers and nature. Such an expectation created an interesting line of subversion within the dynamics of the Second Circle: Watercolors were Marin’s primary medium, his bold, angular composition an assertion of rationality and even maleness, as he was often regarded by critics as a “male painter”, his masculinity key to understanding his artwork just as O’Keeffe’s femininity was crucial to understanding hers
[8]
W. M. Corn, The Great American Thing: Modern Art and National Identity, 1915-1935, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.
[8]
. Likewise, Charles Demuth’s earlier work embraced studies of flowers, a theme which had connotations of queerness among artistic circles. Thus, multiple transgressive nuances flounced Six + X. Nevertheless, O’Keeffe was often criticized by art critics of her time for her paintings of skyscrapers, a theme that Stieglitz had sternly warned her against undertaking since it was “a man’s theme” as were murals, a subject which “even men hadn’t done too well with”
[8]
W. M. Corn, The Great American Thing: Modern Art and National Identity, 1915-1935, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.
[8]
. One of her most fervent critics was Milton Brown, who said of O’Keeffe’s skyscrapers: “Such paintings as The Shelton... and The American Radiator Building... in which she introduced irrelevant embellishments, are decorative designs no more substantial than flower petals” (emphasis my own)
[2]
A. Chave, "Who Will Paint New York? ‘The World's New Art Center’ and the Skyscraper Paintings of Georgia O'Keeffe," American Art, vol. 5, no. 1/2, pp. 86-107, 1991.
[2]
. For Chave, the “awkwardness” of Manhattan stems from the disembodied flowers which float about the painting. However, if they are viewed, as Corn suggests, O’Keeffe’s “autobiographical claim” to the masculine subject of skyscrapers, then the flowers acquire a more transgressive meaning as symbols of feminine power, just as animal bones later became “her symbols of the desert”
[9]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, From Faraway, Nearby. [Art]. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1937.
[9]
.
3. The Faraway, Near: Manhattan as a Symbol of Personal Transformation
A second possible reading of the flowers relates to O’Keeffe’s germinating life in New Mexico. The peonies and calico roses presented in Manhattan resemble those crafted from cloth by New Mexican women, mostly for funereal purposes, subtly cuing her work with ideas of rebirth and transformation. The idea that Manhattan could represent O’Keeffe’s rebirth after her move to the Southwest is supported by the earthy color scheme of the painting. Hues of terracotta intercalate desert rose and sky blue. Darker forest greens recede to the background, outlining colonial style architectural forms. Do they allude to the forestry of Lake George, that oft-visited summer retreat from a life now fading from the rearview mirror? In a letter from June 1st, 1932, Stieglitz wrote to O’Keeffe, “Lake George means little to you—I know what I am to you. And my hope is that you know what you are to me”. The scene in Manhattan is based on Stieglitz’s last series of city photographs – specifically, From My Window at an American Place, North.
Figure 2. Comparison between From My Window at an American Place, North by Alfred Stieglitz and Manhattan by Georgia O’Keeffe. Source for Stieglitz photograph: Wanda M. Corn, Great American Thing: Modern Art and National Identity, 1915-1935 (Berkeley: University of California Press), 22-25.
Pressured to meet the MoMA’s deadline, O’Keeffe chose to work with an existing composition, albeit with some modifications
[4]
W. M. Corn, "Painting Big -- O'Keeffe's Manhattan," American Art, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 22-25, 2006.
[4]
. For the left panel of the original Manhattan triptych, she syncretized the view between the left and right visual planes as captured by Stieglitz in the photograph. In that same panel, now either lost or destroyed by O’Keeffe, she also updated the view to reflect the Art Deco outline of the Chrysler Building, newly built in 1930. In the main panel, however, the one that O’Keeffe saved, the central skyscraper appears to be a semi-abstract rendition of the white building, leftward in the Stieglitz photograph, emphasizing its scalloped outline along with two bold lines. Rendered at an angle, the building appears as if in the act of “coming to life”, with protruding shards bursting out of its ribs. Thus, the central monolith in Manhattan heralds a new life sprouting from the spiritual womb, attuned to O’Keeffe’s newly ascetic image as {Priestess of the Desert}. While Stieglitz previously boosted her art as divinely feminine the subject here, one of man-made construction as opposed to one birthed from nature, invites reflection about the dynamics of gender and creation
[8]
W. M. Corn, The Great American Thing: Modern Art and National Identity, 1915-1935, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.
[8]
. Bleached like her animal bones, the building evokes similar ideas of metaphysical mystery and supernatural awe.
4. The Skyscraper as a Relic of Greatness During the Great Depression
Is Manhattan a relic of a pioneering past? If we consider Manhattan as a moment of triumph for O’Keeffe, the skyscraper becomes an artistic trophy for the pioneering artist, analogous to the bison heads and animal skulls mounted on Southwestern homes in the late 1800s. Similar ideas of a pioneering spirit were tackled by O’Keeffe in her celebrated work, Cow’s Skull – Red, White and Blue, where bovine skull stands against a vivid background with patriotic verve
[12]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, Cow's Skull -- Red, White and Blue. [Art]. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1931.
[12]
. The work boosted the Southwest, the animal skull motif acting as a standard which would define much of O’Keeffe’s subsequent work. After Manhattan was accepted into the MoMA’s 1932 mural exhibition, it was shown alongside Cow’s Skull with Calico Roses, a work which restricts the color palette in Manhattan to its muted hues
[3]
Murals by American Painters and Photographers, New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1932, May 3-31.
[3]
. Completed just one year earlier, the similarity between both compositions is striking: in Manhattan, a pink calico rose crowns the bone-white monolith on its right, just like the white rose adorns the cow’s skull in Calico Roses. The skyscraper’s dual stripes resemble the bold stripe acting as the background for the cow’s skull in the earlier work, though these were, in fact, the visual representation of a striped mantle which O’Keeffe brought to New York from New Mexico, modeled with panache in a portrait by Stieglitz. An earlier painting, Horse’s Skull with Pink Rose is even more compositionally resonant with Manhattan: A pink calico rose rests softly at right on the horse’s skull, the pink flower re-emerging similarly atop the Manhattan skyscraper. The established parallel suggests two possible meanings: first, O’Keeffe as a “woman pioneer” of the skyscraper genre; second, more by proxy, the pioneering spirit of the skyscraper itself (Figure 3).
Figure 3. (A) Stieglitz, Alfred, Georgia O'Keeffe: A Portrait, 1930, gelatin silver print, in Corn (1999), 167, photo taken by the author; (B) Georgia O'Keeffe, Horse Skull with Pink Rose, 1931, Los Angeles County Museum of Art Foundation, https://collections.lacma.org/node/176444; (C) Georgia O'Keeffe, Cow's Skull with Calico Roses, 1931, Art Institute of Chicago.
O’Keeffe painted both works in New York, having brought the animal skulls with her as her icons of the desert. In the exhibition pamphlet for From Faraway, Nearby, O’Keeffe said of the animal bones: “To me they are as beautiful as anything I know. To me they are strangely more living than the animals walking around—hair, eyes and all with their tails switching” (emphasis added by author). By comparing the skyscraper to the animal bones, they acquire a similar spiritual largesse, an expansiveness of spirit proper of the pioneer. When skyscrapers made their debut in the 1910s, they were sublime in the most awe-inspiring, Romantic sense. Their visually striking nature was considered an “assault on accepted conventions of beauty” by architect Hugh Ferriss, who defined “conventional beauty” as that which evoked or relied on either pleasure or pain, familiarity, and habit. Thus, skyscrapers were not necessarily meant to be conventionally beautiful – they meant to impress a sense of awe and newfound power, cementing modern regional architectural conventions as distinctively American. More practically, skyscraper construction in New York would allow regulations from 1918 to take effect, freeing city space to “admit light and air to the streets” fulfilling its potential.
To O’Keeffe’s eyes, then, the skyscraper was a majestic creature, inspiring as the embodiment of progress, yet at a standstill at the time of the painting: the Great Crash of Wall Street, taking place in 1929, decimated wildly optimistic hopes of financial success that had surged alongside the skyscraper. Unknown to O’Keeffe and the nation, the tide would slowly turn just one year later. Upon being elected, Roosevelt began creating a series of federal programs to boost employment for artists and creatives. Many of these programs would either pay working artists a defined salary or payment sum upon completion of a commissioned mural. Working class artists like Ben Shahn strongly benefited from these programs, himself also submitting The Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti mural to the MoMA exhibition
[15]
A. Anreus, Ben Shahn and the Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2001, pp. 117-118.
[15]
. Federally sponsored artists were encouraged to tackle issues of social justice and the usefulness of art, so that Shahn’s mural, for example, worked with a highly controversial case of racial injustice leading to execution. While O’Keeffe’s Manhattan appears to address a more personal endeavor of transformation, Stieglitz was nevertheless opposed to the earned commission from Radio City Music Hall, in part because he was against the democratization of art, which entails a dialogue between mainstream and marginalized
[2]
A. Chave, "Who Will Paint New York? ‘The World's New Art Center’ and the Skyscraper Paintings of Georgia O'Keeffe," American Art, vol. 5, no. 1/2, pp. 86-107, 1991.
[16]
M. Krenn, “On the Democratization of Art,” in Urban Citizenship: Democratising Democracy, 2017, p. n. pag.
[2, 16]
. It must be said, however, that context was not lost on Stieglitz, who had written to her over the summer with concern over the hectic nature of the commission: “I know I’m being difficult but much is due to the extraordinarily difficult times we are all living in”
[10]
S. Greenough, Ed., My Faraway One: Selected Letters of Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz: Volume One, 1915-1933, vol. 1, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2011.
[10]
. By choosing to work with more prominent cubist elements and futuristic motifs in Manhattan, O’Keeffe participated in the cultural dialogue of her time. In this context, the skyscraper, surrounded by small funereal flowers, becomes an homage for the ideals of progress espoused to the machine age, giving way to a more social, community-centered perspective.
5. Meeting the Commission: Issues of Gender and Relationship Strife
Though Manhattan earned O’Keeffe a commission to paint the Ladies’ Powder Room in Radio City Music Hall, it was under the condition that O’Keeffe remove the skyscrapers in favor of flowers. Once again, issues of gender and non-normativity emerged regarding the skyscraper as a male theme and the insistence on flowers as feminine. Even though O’Keeffe accepted these conditions, Stieglitz continued to pressure her to withdraw, insisting that the commission fee was too low
[4]
W. M. Corn, "Painting Big -- O'Keeffe's Manhattan," American Art, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 22-25, 2006.
[4]
. Greenough remarks that O’Keeffe accepted $1500 for the commission, while male artists were paid considerably more
[10]
S. Greenough, Ed., My Faraway One: Selected Letters of Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz: Volume One, 1915-1933, vol. 1, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2011.
[10]
. Others close to Stieglitz and O’Keeffe also advised her to withdraw from the project, claiming that the continued postponement of the site’s construction was “a mess”
[10]
S. Greenough, Ed., My Faraway One: Selected Letters of Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz: Volume One, 1915-1933, vol. 1, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2011.
[10]
. O’Keeffe seemed to have taken these acrimonious blockades of destiny as creative challenges, though not without their toll. To Brett, a colleague at the University of Texas, she wrote: “No one in my world wants me to do it (…) [the painting’s] maybe a bit tender for what it has to stand in that kind of world” (emphasis my own)
[10]
S. Greenough, Ed., My Faraway One: Selected Letters of Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz: Volume One, 1915-1933, vol. 1, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2011.
[10]
. To Beck Strand, friend and wife of photographer Paul Strand, she vented— “My Gawd won’t I get Hell if I can’t make a go of it”.
Despite numerous delays and runarounds regarding the project start date, O’Keeffe went ahead with the commission. From initial viewings of the room in July to November, by the time she started working on the project, she discovered that the canvas she was to work with had been applied to wet plaster and was peeling away at the walls. Without enough time to reapply the canvas to paint the mural, O’Keeffe finally relented and withdrew from the project. Experiencing the crushing disappointment and humiliation of a worst fear come true (she had written to Brett in August: “experimenting so publicly is a bit precarious in every way”) O’Keeffe had the only known mental breakdown of her career. Soon after the withdrawal, she proposed to Stieglitz a definitive separation, which he refused. It took two years after the events of Manhattan for O’Keeffe to reclaim the brush and continue painting
. The final commission, which ultimately went to Japanese emigre Yasuo Kuniyoshi, features a calm, floral motif in an illustrative, botanical style, set against a soft, desert-like landscape (Figure 4). Sand gives way to sky as soft blue envelops an artificial Sun
[18]
Y. Kuniyoshi, Artist, Mural in Women's Powder Room. [Art]. Radio City Music Hall, 1932.
[18]
. The muted color palette, though harmonious with its surroundings, contrasts densely with O’Keeffe’s original work, with its busy, jagged forms and vibrant earthy hues – a mural for an energetic, modern woman.
Figure 4. Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Mural in Women's Powder Room, Radio City Music Hall, 1932, Radio City Music Hall. Source: https://evergreene.com/projects/radio-city-music-hall/.
O’Keeffe spent most of her two-year recovery in Bermuda, returning to New Mexico in the Summer of 1934. Just two months later she visited her beloved Ghost Ranch and “immediately decided to move there”. Though O’Keeffe would definitively move to New Mexico after Stieglitz’s passing in 1949, the ’34 visit inspired more decisively Southwestern works like Ghost Ranch Landscape, an expansive oil painting rendered on a canvas of twelve by thirty inches, and more experimental work like Banana Flower No. II, a charcoal depiction of a banana flower in sepia tones
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, Banana Flower No. II. [Art]. Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, 1934.
[19, 20]
. As a plant heavy with tropical and ethnic connotations, Banana Flower No. II once again suggests O’Keeffe’s desire to engage with more varied sociocultural perspectives.
Towards the end of the decade O’Keeffe also produced the seminal From Faraway, Nearby, which she originally titled Deer’s Horns, Near Cameron, named after the Arizona town that she visited with photographer Ansel Adams. The painting features the large skull of a mule deer, from its head stemming a complex tangle of horns. In contrast to O’Keeffe’s earlier work with fully bleached animal skulls, the mule deer, in a soft earthy hue, appears faintly alive, merely sleeping. The later renaming, which happened sometime in 1966, may have referenced terms of endearment which Stieglitz used in his letters, such as “My Far Away One”. Enhancing the poetic quality of the work, From Faraway, Nearby also alludes to that keenness of eye which brought the far closer and the near, far. Such was the case in Manhattan, where O’Keeffe brought the monolithic relic closer to the eye, an examination of a life renewed, a view no longer her own.
6. Manhattan and Abstract Expressionism: Pollock’s Ritual and Kline’s Black Reflections
What else can be said about Manhattan as a symbol of transformation? Yasuo Kuniyoshi, an accomplished artist in his own right, rendered a version of the mural reminiscent of O’Keeffe’s distant desert themes, perhaps an homage of sorts to the daring artist. Though Manhattan was taught to have been destroyed, the central panel appeared in the artist’s collection when it became available for study. Despite the discord surrounding Manhattan and its commission, the painting was successfully exhibited at the MoMA’s Murals by American Painters and Photographers in May of 1932
[3]
Murals by American Painters and Photographers, New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1932, May 3-31.
[3]
. The striking scale of the canvas would have evoked a sense of awe like that of an actual skyscraper. With its dynamic, cubist figurations and its bold sense of proto abstraction, it would have inspired the curious, artistic eye among many of its viewers. As such, one wonders if Manhattan had a role in shaping the sharp, expressive visual notes of Abstract Expressionism.
A visual analysis of Jackson Pollock’s Ritual inspires such reflection
[22]
J. Pollock, Artist, Ritual. [Art]. National Gallery of Art, 1953.
[22]
. Rendered in a similarly large canvas – slightly taller at ninety inches – Ritual appears as an abstract portrait of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan in the succinct architecture of its abstract forms. Amidst a warm haze of fused color, two strong lines diagonally traverse the plane in a style similar to O’Keeffe’s bone-like monolith. More laterally, two triangular curves swerve sharply, peaking outwards like the saw tooths from O’Keeffe’s “great white” monolith – an apex predator in the urban sea, though not quite as voracious as Manhattan. Still, the diffuse, organic palette of Pollock’s Ritual, emphasizing gold hues, points to a similar sense of divine charge in its swirling forms – the frenetic energy of the city itself, perhaps, as it rises and rumbles to life in perpetual waking.
Figure 5. Comparison between Jackson Pollock’s Ritual (1953) and O’Keeffe’s Manhattan. Similar canvas size, diagonals and curvilinear elements, evoke a resonance among compositions.
Black Reflections by Franz Kline is another Abstract Expressionist painting evocative O’Keeffe’s Manhattan. Kline, an American artist who transitioned from representational work to expressionist abstraction, finished Black Reflections towards the end of the 1950s. The outline of the sordid black mass central to Kline’s painting has some resemblance to that of the skyscraper-meets-adobe composition in O’Keeffe’s Manhattan. Triangles peek succinctly at the front and sides of the mass. Likewise, the title Black Reflections suggests an element of introspection and spirituality proper to the concept, also present in the work of Pollock and O’Keeffe – both part of distinct groups which valued the spiritual dimension of the American landscape.
Figure 6. Comparison of Composition Between O’Keeffe’s Manhattan and Kline’s Black Reflections. Visual analysis sketch completed by the author.
It was the task of Abstract Expressionism to convey the spirit of the city through non-representational forms, which it did with Pollock at the helm. However, in O’Keeffe’s Manhattan one sees a precursory idea to Abstract Expressionism in the sharp awakening of the monolith, a figurative representation stirring towards the abstracted tendency of later years. The buoyant essence of the city waking a giant from its slumber, conscious of new American way of life.
7. Conclusion
Though perhaps not as renowned as her floral paintings or Southwestern landscapes, Georgia O’Keeffe’s Manhattan (1932) is nevertheless an important work in the artist’s oeuvre. While its creation was fraught with strife, it revealed important insights into O’Keeffe’s transition from consummate New Yorker to Southwestern Pioneer, as suggested by the painting’s rustic color scheme and the skyscraper’s bone-white hue, parallel to her animal bone motif. The formal experimentations undertaken in this work arguably led to an increasingly liberated style in O’Keeffe’s later paintings, with more expansive, mural-like canvases that evoked a sense of awe and spiritual awareness grounded in nature. Manhattan is also vital in understanding O’Keeffe’s relationship with gender and her bold undertaking of what was understood as a “man’s theme” during her time. Her artistic courage and persistence in working with both skyscrapers and murals may have inspired later pioneers in Abstract Expressionism like Jackson Pollock and Franz Kline. Thus, an analysis of Manhattan clarifies its contribution to O’Keeffe’s – if not modern America’s – sociocultural transformation.
Author Contributions
Robmarie Lopez is the sole author. The author read and approved the final manuscript.
Conflicts of Interest
The author declares no conflicts of interest.
Appendix
A full list of figures can be found at https://figshare.com/articles/figure/Appendix_of_Figures/28551959?file=52848824.
References
[1]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, Manhattan. [Art]. Smithsonian American Art Museum, 1932.
[2]
A. Chave, "Who Will Paint New York? ‘The World's New Art Center’ and the Skyscraper Paintings of Georgia O'Keeffe," American Art, vol. 5, no. 1/2, pp. 86-107, 1991.
[3]
Murals by American Painters and Photographers, New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1932, May 3-31.
[4]
W. M. Corn, "Painting Big -- O'Keeffe's Manhattan," American Art, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 22-25, 2006.
[5]
O'Keeffe, "So I said to myself - I'll paint what I see," 2018.
[6]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, Back of Marie's No. 4. [Art]. Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, 1931.
[7]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, Radiator Building -- Night, New York. [Art]. Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, 1927.
[8]
W. M. Corn, The Great American Thing: Modern Art and National Identity, 1915-1935, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.
[9]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, From Faraway, Nearby. [Art]. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1937.
[10]
S. Greenough, Ed., My Faraway One: Selected Letters of Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz: Volume One, 1915-1933, vol. 1, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2011.
[11]
A. Stieglitz, Artist, From My Window at an American Place. [Art]. 1930-31.
[12]
G. O'Keeffe, Artist, Cow's Skull -- Red, White and Blue. [Art]. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1931.
[13]
A. Stieglitz, Artist, Georgia O’Keeffe: A Portrait. [Art]. 1930.
[14]
H. Ferriss, "Project for Glass Skyscraper," in Machine Age Exposition Catalogue, New York, 1927, pp. 5-6.
[15]
A. Anreus, Ben Shahn and the Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2001, pp. 117-118.
[16]
M. Krenn, “On the Democratization of Art,” in Urban Citizenship: Democratising Democracy, 2017, p. n. pag.
Lopez, R. (2025). Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan. International Journal of Literature and Arts, 13(2), 42-48. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
Lopez, R. Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan. Int. J. Lit. Arts2025, 13(2), 42-48. doi: 10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
Lopez R. Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan. Int J Lit Arts. 2025;13(2):42-48. doi: 10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
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author = {Robmarie Lopez},
title = {Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan
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journal = {International Journal of Literature and Arts},
volume = {13},
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pages = {42-48},
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abstract = {Oddly rendered in abstract, cubist forms, O’Keeffe’s Manhattan (1932) is a transitional work in the artist’s canon. Painted as a commission for a mural proposal exhibition, Manhattan features elements unusual for the artist at the time: a sublimely large canvas, a sense of geometric minimalism, a series of floating peonies and calico roses which intriguingly contrast with the skyscraper theme of the painting. A formal and visual analysis of Manhattan suggests that its unusual composition acts as a precursor to works of 1950’s Abstract Expressionism like Pollock’s Ritual and Kline’s Black Reflections. Endogenous to the painting, issues of gender and woman-as-pioneer are addressed using flowers to feminize the theme of the skyscraper, considered a masculine subject in O’Keeffe’s time. Alternative readings to the established triumph of gender include that of personal transformation and of the skyscraper as a relic of the naïve optimism of the gilded age. By echoing the color palette and composition of animal skull works like Cow’s Skull with Calico Roses, O’Keeffe established a parallel between the mystical and animistic qualities of animal bones and the otherworldly quality of the skyscraper as an awe-inspiring monolith of progress. Experimentations with arrangement also suggest the skyscraper and its ideals are dormant rather than dead, “coming to life” despite the dark circumstances which surround the nation. Thus, an analysis of Manhattan can further clarify the development of Abstract Expressionism as well as the themes underlying American modern art in the 1930s and O’Keeffe’s artistic and personal transformation.
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}
TY - JOUR
T1 - Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan
AU - Robmarie Lopez
Y1 - 2025/04/10
PY - 2025
N1 - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
DO - 10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
T2 - International Journal of Literature and Arts
JF - International Journal of Literature and Arts
JO - International Journal of Literature and Arts
SP - 42
EP - 48
PB - Science Publishing Group
SN - 2331-057X
UR - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
AB - Oddly rendered in abstract, cubist forms, O’Keeffe’s Manhattan (1932) is a transitional work in the artist’s canon. Painted as a commission for a mural proposal exhibition, Manhattan features elements unusual for the artist at the time: a sublimely large canvas, a sense of geometric minimalism, a series of floating peonies and calico roses which intriguingly contrast with the skyscraper theme of the painting. A formal and visual analysis of Manhattan suggests that its unusual composition acts as a precursor to works of 1950’s Abstract Expressionism like Pollock’s Ritual and Kline’s Black Reflections. Endogenous to the painting, issues of gender and woman-as-pioneer are addressed using flowers to feminize the theme of the skyscraper, considered a masculine subject in O’Keeffe’s time. Alternative readings to the established triumph of gender include that of personal transformation and of the skyscraper as a relic of the naïve optimism of the gilded age. By echoing the color palette and composition of animal skull works like Cow’s Skull with Calico Roses, O’Keeffe established a parallel between the mystical and animistic qualities of animal bones and the otherworldly quality of the skyscraper as an awe-inspiring monolith of progress. Experimentations with arrangement also suggest the skyscraper and its ideals are dormant rather than dead, “coming to life” despite the dark circumstances which surround the nation. Thus, an analysis of Manhattan can further clarify the development of Abstract Expressionism as well as the themes underlying American modern art in the 1930s and O’Keeffe’s artistic and personal transformation.
VL - 13
IS - 2
ER -
Lopez, R. (2025). Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan. International Journal of Literature and Arts, 13(2), 42-48. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
Lopez, R. Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan. Int. J. Lit. Arts2025, 13(2), 42-48. doi: 10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
Lopez R. Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan. Int J Lit Arts. 2025;13(2):42-48. doi: 10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
@article{10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14,
author = {Robmarie Lopez},
title = {Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan
},
journal = {International Journal of Literature and Arts},
volume = {13},
number = {2},
pages = {42-48},
doi = {10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14},
url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14},
eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ijla.20251302.14},
abstract = {Oddly rendered in abstract, cubist forms, O’Keeffe’s Manhattan (1932) is a transitional work in the artist’s canon. Painted as a commission for a mural proposal exhibition, Manhattan features elements unusual for the artist at the time: a sublimely large canvas, a sense of geometric minimalism, a series of floating peonies and calico roses which intriguingly contrast with the skyscraper theme of the painting. A formal and visual analysis of Manhattan suggests that its unusual composition acts as a precursor to works of 1950’s Abstract Expressionism like Pollock’s Ritual and Kline’s Black Reflections. Endogenous to the painting, issues of gender and woman-as-pioneer are addressed using flowers to feminize the theme of the skyscraper, considered a masculine subject in O’Keeffe’s time. Alternative readings to the established triumph of gender include that of personal transformation and of the skyscraper as a relic of the naïve optimism of the gilded age. By echoing the color palette and composition of animal skull works like Cow’s Skull with Calico Roses, O’Keeffe established a parallel between the mystical and animistic qualities of animal bones and the otherworldly quality of the skyscraper as an awe-inspiring monolith of progress. Experimentations with arrangement also suggest the skyscraper and its ideals are dormant rather than dead, “coming to life” despite the dark circumstances which surround the nation. Thus, an analysis of Manhattan can further clarify the development of Abstract Expressionism as well as the themes underlying American modern art in the 1930s and O’Keeffe’s artistic and personal transformation.
},
year = {2025}
}
TY - JOUR
T1 - Of Women Pioneers, Relics and Proto-Abstractions: A Visual Analysis of O’Keeffe’s Manhattan
AU - Robmarie Lopez
Y1 - 2025/04/10
PY - 2025
N1 - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
DO - 10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
T2 - International Journal of Literature and Arts
JF - International Journal of Literature and Arts
JO - International Journal of Literature and Arts
SP - 42
EP - 48
PB - Science Publishing Group
SN - 2331-057X
UR - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20251302.14
AB - Oddly rendered in abstract, cubist forms, O’Keeffe’s Manhattan (1932) is a transitional work in the artist’s canon. Painted as a commission for a mural proposal exhibition, Manhattan features elements unusual for the artist at the time: a sublimely large canvas, a sense of geometric minimalism, a series of floating peonies and calico roses which intriguingly contrast with the skyscraper theme of the painting. A formal and visual analysis of Manhattan suggests that its unusual composition acts as a precursor to works of 1950’s Abstract Expressionism like Pollock’s Ritual and Kline’s Black Reflections. Endogenous to the painting, issues of gender and woman-as-pioneer are addressed using flowers to feminize the theme of the skyscraper, considered a masculine subject in O’Keeffe’s time. Alternative readings to the established triumph of gender include that of personal transformation and of the skyscraper as a relic of the naïve optimism of the gilded age. By echoing the color palette and composition of animal skull works like Cow’s Skull with Calico Roses, O’Keeffe established a parallel between the mystical and animistic qualities of animal bones and the otherworldly quality of the skyscraper as an awe-inspiring monolith of progress. Experimentations with arrangement also suggest the skyscraper and its ideals are dormant rather than dead, “coming to life” despite the dark circumstances which surround the nation. Thus, an analysis of Manhattan can further clarify the development of Abstract Expressionism as well as the themes underlying American modern art in the 1930s and O’Keeffe’s artistic and personal transformation.
VL - 13
IS - 2
ER -
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