GEORGIA O'KEEFFE MUSEUM

Dubbed the "mother of American modernism," painter Georgia O'Keeffe (1887-1986) is famous for her paintings of New York skyscrapers, for her close-ups of flowers flirting with abstraction, and for her buffalo skulls against a backdrop of shimmering desert landscapes.

O'Keeffe was born in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, to dairy farmers. She became interested in art at an early age and at the age of 10 she learned the basics of painting from a local watercolorist. At 18, she entered the prestigious Art Institute of Chicago and then the Art Students League of New York where she won her first award for her still life, Dead Rabbit. While in New York, she visited art galleries including Gallery 291, owned by her future husband, photographer Alfred Stieglitz. After her training, she gave up art for a while and returned to Chicago, where she became a commercial artist. In 1912, she returned to art classes at the University of Virginia, where she discovered new modes of expression and began to develop a personal style, moving away from realism and experimenting with abstract compositions. Her paintings were first exhibited at Gallery 291 in New York, where she moved. She met Alfred Stieglitz, who brought her into his circle, which included many well-known artists such as Charles Demuth and Paul Strand, who had a great influence on her art. It was during this period that she tried oil painting. In the 1920s, nature plays a major role in her work. She painted more than 200 paintings of flowers, which made her famous, such as Oriental Puppies (1928) and Jimson Weed (1932). Then it was the skyscrapers of New York, which she painted in a precisionist style, that became her greatest source of inspiration. In 1929, she left for New Mexico where she discovered the desert and the mountains, landscapes of raw beauty that inspired one of her most famous works, The Lawrence Tree. She returned to the Santa Fe area several times to draw inspiration for her paintings. In 1943, the Art Institute of Chicago devoted a retrospective exhibition to her. The MoMa, in New York, did the same three years later, for its first retrospective devoted to a female artist. In 1949, three years after the death of her husband, she settled permanently in New Mexico, where she continued to paint. In the 1970s, she began to lose her sight. Her autobiography, published in 1976, was a great success. Georgia O'Keeffe died in 1986, at the age of 98, leaving behind nearly 900 paintings. The Santa Fe Museum, opened in 1997, presents the largest permanent exhibition of works by this major artist in the history of American art.

The Georges Pompidou Center also recently held a retrospective of her work, with paintings, photographs and objects from her home in Abiquiu.

The Santa Fe Museum offers a collection that gives a round and precise portrait of Georgia O'Keefe's life, from her paintings of New York cityscapes to radical abstractions of color and form. The galleries take us on a journey through the evolution of her painting and her subjects of inspiration, from the more realistic to the more abstract, through light and dark, color and form. The museum has also recently added a section entitled Making a Life, exploring Georgia O'Keefe's lifestyle, from her little-known passion for cooking, including, for example, her special recipes and favorite books, to her style of dress or her different art tools. There are also examples where O'Keefe has ventured into the realm of sculpture, with molds and wavy, abstract sculpture. The influence of the New Mexico landscape, as well as the local Indian and Hispanic culture, is also evident through the presence of objects such as bird feathers, natural pigments, animal bones, snake skins... Intrinsic to his creative approach is a meditation through nature itself, through an intimate relationship with the fauna and flora of New Mexico. A beautiful exhibition located at the back of the last room of the main gallery. One comes out deeply touched by this poetic and tender woman. Go to the gift shop to buy a beautiful book on the work of Georgia O'Keefe, or to offer you souvenirs to bring back from your visit, between jewelry, brushes, scarves, t-shirts, books and literature on art...

The museum also offers in season, from March to November, visits of the artist's house, the Georgia O'Keeffe Home and Studio, located in the middle of nature, about 60 miles northwest of Santa Fe (from 35 US$, book well in advance). A visit that we highly recommend, just for the village of Abiquiu itself, surrounded by spectacular landscapes that bring us back to the atmosphere of Georgia O'Keefe's paintings, whose work has given us a new perspective through which to see the world. Red rock, yellow cliffs, vast blue skies: the abstractions and shapes of her paintings become a reality.

Beware, it is sometimes difficult to find parking in the area, so we advise you to go to a paid parking.