Georgia O'Keeffe -- Who Drew Her?

Who drew this 1970 caricature of Georgia O'Keeffe?

This caricature of Georgia O'Keeffe appeared on the back of a 1970 news release issued by the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York announcing the opening of her retrospective exhibit.  The caricature is in a private collection and the artist is unknown.

When I saw this caricature, I immediately thought of Marius de Zayas. 

Marius de Zayas, George H. Seeley and J. Nilsen Laurvik, 1910

But no, the O'Keeffe caricature was from 1970; couldn't be de Zayas, he died in 1961.  If you have any idea of who might have drawn this O'Keeffe caricature, please let me know.

Which brings me to de Zayas.  He was connected to Georgia O'Keeffe way back when . . .

Marius de Zayas, by Alfred Stieglitz, 1913

Marius de Zayas was important member of the avant-garde group of painters and photographers, called the Stieglitz Circle, whose work was shown at Alfred Stieglitz’s Gallery 291 in New York from 1903 until 1918. 

Marius de Zayas was born in Veracruz, Mexico, but lived much of his life in New York City.   He collaborated with Alfred Stieglitz in bringing the first exhibitions of modern art to the Americas. In January 1909 Stieglitz exhibited a group of de Zayas's caricatures at his art Gallery 291. 

Alfred Stieglitz also published Camera Work a magazine devoted to photography, other forms of modern art and literary articles.  Camera Work published photos of  modern art (Picasso, Rodin) and of the modern art exhibitions, such as in the photo below.

Alfred Stieglitz, Camera Work, No. 14 (showing Gallery), MOMA

Volume No. 46 of Camera Work reproduced ten caricatures drawn in charcoal by de Zayas,  It was issued just after Georgia O’Keeffe arrived in New York to study with Dow at Columbia University Teachers College in 1916 -- and just before she moved to Texas to teach at West Texas Normal College.

Georgia O'Keeffe, 1915, Art Teacher, Columbia College, South Carolina

Georgia O'Keeffe's first modern art works, made in 1915 and 1916, were abstract charcoal drawings that combined her well-developed academic drawing techniques with modernist approaches as in the charcoal drawings by Pablo Picasso and the highly shaded drawings of Marius de Zayas. 

O'Keeffe has seen works of de Zayas when she visited Gallery 291 as an art student in New York in 1914-1915. She avidly read  the magazine Camera Work and had seen drawings by de Zayas there.  In his caricatures, de Zayas often  used rich black shadows and spot-lit faces and hands to create effects similar to  photography.  He also frequently used a wave-like composition. 

Compare the work of de Zayas with early Georgia O'Keeffe charcoals.

Georgia O'Keeffe, Abstraction, 1915

De Zayas and O’Keeffe -- modernist charcoal technique.  










                                            

  

Rodin and Steichen, 
De Zayas, Marius,
Camera Work XLVI, 1914

In her early abstractions, O'Keeffe echoed the subtle range of grays seen in De Zayas’s abstraction Mrs. Eugene Meyer, Jr. and highlighting.in other caractures.

Mrs. Eugene Meyer, Jr.

De Zayas, Marius,

Camera Work XLVI, 1914

24.3 x 18 cm

Photogravure

Georgia O'Keeffe, Early No. 2, 1915

Mrs. Brown Potter
De Zayas, Marius, b.1880-1961
Camera Work XXIX, 1910
Photogravure

Georgia O'Keeffe,Special No. 12, 1916, The Museum of Modern Art, Gift of The Georgia O'Keeffe Foundation

Alfred Stieglitz
De Zayas, Marius,
Camera Work XLVI, 1914
23.6 x 17.8 cm

Special No. 15, Georgia O'Keeffe, Charcoal on paper, 1916, Georgia O'Keeffe Museum 

In 1917, Alfred Stieglitz showed Georgia O'Keeffe's early charcoal abstractions at his Gallery 291. 

Alfred Stieglitz began photographing Georgia O'Keeffe with her art in 1916 and continued to photograph her until he died in 1946.

Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O'Keeffe, 1917, MOMA, Gift of Georgia O'Keeffe, through the generosity of The Georgia O'Keeffe Foundation and Jennifer and Joseph Duke, 1997

Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O'Keeffe, 1918, Metropolitan Museum of Art

                       Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O'Keeffe, 1918, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Georgia O'Keeffe,  through
 the generosity of The Georgia O'Keeffe Foundation and Jennifer and Joseph Duke

In  2003 the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum held an exhibit Debating American Modernism which included  Georgia O'Keeffe, Alfred Stieglitz and Marius de Zayas as well as others of the New York avant-garde.  

  

Debating American Modernism, exhibition catalogue, Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, 2003
cover Marcel Duchamp, Fountain, 1917

In 2004 The Metropolitan Museum of Art held an exhibition Marius de Zayas & The Stieglitz Circle.

And the style of de Zayas continues in contemporary fashion photography . . .

Frankie Rayder by Steven Meisel, Vogue Italia, Jan 1999 

But we still don't know who drew the 1970 caricature of Georgia O'Keeffe.

What do you think?  Please comment in the box below and join the discussion.