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Shop nowPortrait of an Artist
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Learn moreGeorgia O'Keeffe was one of the most original painters America has ever produced. Her vivid visual vocabulary—sensuous flowers, bleached bones against red sky and earth—has had a profound and lasting influence on American art in this century.
Renowned for her fierce independence, iron determination, and unique artistic vision, O'Keeffe had a personal mystique as intriguing and enduring as her bold, brilliant canvasses. Here is a full account of her exceptional life—from her girlhood and early days as a controversial art teacher, to her discovery by the pioneering photographer of the New York avant-garde Alfred Stieglitz, to her seclusion in the New Mexico desert, where she lived until her death. Here also is the story of a great romance—between the extraordinary painter and her much older mentor, lover, and husband, Stieglitz.
Laurie Lisle is the author of Without Child: Challenging the Stigma of Childlessness and Louise Nevelson: A Passionate Life. She lectures widely on O’Keeffe and writes essays, articles, and book reviews for various publications. She lives with her husband in northwestern Connecticut and Westchester County, New York.
Grace Conlin (1962–1997) was the recording name of Grainne Cassidy, an award-winning actress and acclaimed narrator. She was a member of the Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company in Washington, DC, and won a Helen Hayes Award in 1988 for her role in Woolly Mammoth’s production of Savage in Limbo.
Reviews
“What a personality emerges from these pages! Lisle provides us with fascinating details of the sort that immediately give life to her subject…Portrait of an Artist is filled with riches, and nearly every remark of Georgia O’Keeffe’s is worth recording.”
“Portrait of an Artist is a sensitive and beautifully documented biography. It moved me deeply—I can’t remember when a book involved me so totally.”
“Laurie Lisle has given us a mortal Georgia O’Keeffe, whose human hunger and frailties, gifts and strengths, enabled her to survive—triumphantly—a conflicted life. Many readers will draw encouragement and even inspiration from this portrait.”
“An excellent portrait of a nearly legendary figure.”
“Readers will welcome what Lisle has found. The woman who emerges has extraordinary personal stature, artistic gifts, commitment to her vision.”
“Portrait of an Artist is a superb piece of work in every respect. Not only does it document the full scope to date of this remarkable twentieth century life but it does so directly, simply, and objectively…Clearly journalist Lisle has scooped the art world with an impressive literary debut.”
“Portrait of an Artist is in many ways a remarkably informative book. Through interviews with O’Keeffe’s friends and acquaintances, by delving into the published an unpublished sources and letters, Lisle has created a vivid and sensitive portrait of O’Keeffe as an artist and woman…she gives a fine and poignant accounting of the relationship between O’Keeffe and Stieglitz…Above and beyond the personal portrait, Lisle’s biography is a marvelous evocation of the American places that have been important in the development of O’Keeffe’s character and her art.”
“This O’Keeffe will shock as much as amuse, chill as much as inspire.”
“Portrait of an Artist is the most comprehensive biography of Georgia O’Keeffe to date. Her life story, that of a pioneer in the modernist movement, an independent woman in a prefeminist age, and the true peer of her life partner, is remarkable. And art critic Laurie Lisle tells it ably.”
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