This is the fortieth year since I met Georgia O'Keeffe, a compelling woman, both in her art and her persona. She is certainly the foremost woman artist of the century, and some would say the century's foremost American artist
1. That's a remarkable statement. Given my age at that time of twenty-four, I had an interaction with an absolutely, almost godess-like kind of a figure, though she didn't appear that way.
There were almost no books in print documenting her life. There was a selective amount of information I had on her at the time, and being excited about the things I was doing, I knew my approach to nature's
energy was different from hers. And we both shared an interest in minimalism, although I was involved with science at the time, she took the mystic's approach.
Although Georgia O'Keeffe was legendary, I was not necessarily aware of that, on a conscious level, anyway. There was much curiosity about her particularly her decision to isolate herself at that point. While that year, in 1965, I enrolled in NYU's graduate program to study with Irving Sandler in his modern art seminar. He commented, "O'Keeffe would be interesting to talk about, why don't you look her up, since you've already met her? She's a hermit. I've never met her. I'm curious about her image as she has fallen out of popularity in New York, after 1946-into the 50's."
2 Later, in 1970 her reemergence caused quite a stir.
These letters are to be seen as a dialogue between a younger and older artist and approached from the view that they are not involved with the kind of scholarship that an art historian is, but rather as involved in a relationship that existed that had it's own dynamic.
The thing you call abstraction is your will to form
translating nature's energy
LIST OF POSTMARKED ENVELOPES AND SIGNED LETTERS FROM O'KEEFFE
sent to Marilynn Thuma
3, Lista de Correo, Jocotepec, Jalisco, Mexico
| 1. |
May 14, 1964 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
Notecard, 9 x 12 |
Handwritten |
| 2. |
July 6, 1968 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
July 3, 1968 |
Handwritten |
| 3. |
July 20, 1968 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
July 20, 1968 |
Handwritten |
| 4. |
July 29, 1968 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
July 27, 1968 |
Handwritten |
| 5. |
Dec 7, 1968 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
Dec 17, 1968 |
Handwritten |
| 6. |
Dec 28, 1968 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
Notecard |
Handwritten |
| 7. |
April 14, 1969 |
New York City |
The Stanhope |
Handwritten |
| 8. |
June 7, 1969 |
Espanola, N.M. |
Zip 87532 |
Handwritten |
| 9. |
June 18, 1969 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
June 18, 1969 |
Handwritten |
| 10. |
October 27, 1969 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
October 26, 1969 |
Handwritten |
| 11. |
Nov 17, 1969 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
Nov 17, 1969 |
Handwritten |
| 12. |
October 20, 1970 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
Check |
Handwritten |
| 13. |
Nov 2, 1970 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
Nov 2, 1970 |
Handwritten |
| 14. |
Nov 6, 1970 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
Nov 6, 1970 |
Handwritten |
| 15. |
May 10, 1971 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
May 8, 1971 |
Typed & Signed, GOK:gr |
| 16. |
July 30, 1971 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
June 29, 1971 |
Typed & Signed, GOK:gr |
| 17. |
Dec 6, 1971 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
Dec 3, 1971 |
Typed Unsigned, GOK:gr |
| 18. |
April 7, 1972 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
April 7, 1972 |
Typed & Signed, GOK:gr |
| 19. |
August 15, 1972 |
Santa Fe, N.M. |
August 18, 1972 |
Typed & Signed, GOK:gr |
| 20. |
May 9, 1973 |
Abiquiu, N.M. |
May 8, 1973 |
Typed & Signed, GOK:vfr |
The above envelopes are imprinted across the reverse flap with:
GEORGIA O'KEEFFE - ABIQUIU, NEW MEXICO, 87510
[1] Ralph Looney, OK & Me: A Treasured Friendship , (Niwot: University Press of Colorado, page 39) wrote: "Her sense of humor stayed as sharp as a well-honed razor and softened her considerable ego. I once showed her an unpublished article I had written that referred to her as "America's greatest woman artist." She smiled, crossed out "woman" with a pen, and handed it back to me, still smiling."
[2] Researching my lecture, "The Pictorial O'Keeffe," Modern Art Seminar 2050, New York University, January 4, 1965, at the Downtown Gallery in New York art dealer Mrs. Edith Halpert showed me G.O.'s many published articles. In catalogues and newspaper clippings she jokingly peeped through a hole in a piece of Swiss cheese she held; or, she used holes in skeletons and liked to look through them as if to focus through the lens of a camera. Her predominant interest in ovoids as holes came out in a later series of pelvis bones. . . I prepared the lecture with borrowed slides, adding Ram's Head, White Hollyhock -- Hills, 1935 after visiting Modernist private collectors, Milton and Edith Lowenthal. They had bought "their OK" from Halpert but had never met the artist. We corresponded over the next 25 years, (see The Lowenthal Papers, reel #4904, available at
SIRIS.)
[3]
The reader will note. that at that time in my career, I used the name Marilynn Thuma. Originally misspelled by a Germanic "th," as Thuma, my surname Tuma
is a Czech name meaning "monument" or, "that which endures." My will-to-form monuments to Nature and organic growth has been my life's ambition. [Latin v. tumere, an artificial mound. i.e.. an ancient burial mound.]
Text written by Mym Tuma, Southampton, NY 11969
All Rights Reserved © Bernard Gotfryd of East Hampton (O'Keeffe, 1970)
Text & Images © 2004-2010, All Rights Reserved
Site By:
Hamptons Online
|
