Eliana Willis

Georgia O’Keeffe was surrounded by photography for most of her life, and yet her own efforts in the medium have largely gone unstudied.
But now, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH) is debuting “Georgia O’Keeffe, Photographer,” the first exhibition devoted to the pioneering modernist’s photographic work. Nearly 100 pictures make up the show, most black and white and all culled from a recently rediscovered archive.
Though she was a casual camera lover in her early decades, O’Keeffe’s marriage to photographer and gallerist Alfred Stieglitz in 1924 found her immersed in the medium like never before. She posed in hundreds of Stieglitz’s portraits, helped make and mount his prints, and even assisted in the design of his shows.
But it wasn’t until the mid-1940s, after the death of her husband, that O’Keeffe began seriously making photographs of her own. Studying with photographer Todd Webb, she found herself turning a lens toward her surroundings in northern New Mexico—often capturing chemically the same subjects she painted years before.
Georgia O’Keeffe, Forbidding Canyon, Glen Canyon (September 1964). © Georgia O’KeeffeMuseum.
It’s not hard to tell that O’Keeffe was the eye behind the images—and not just because the majority of them feature the same beloved New Mexican landscapes and flora that populate her paintings. Her signature sense of composition is there, too. You can recognize it in the way she photographs the bodily curves of riverbeds and adobe homes, or in her fascination with the long, graphic shadows that dramatize the desert every morning and afternoon. Her ability to capture nature’s feminine grace remains unparalleled.
After the show’s run in Texas, it will head to the Addison Gallery of American Art in Andover, Massachusetts. There, when the exhibition opens in February of next year, it will do so alongside two other presentations meant to contextualize O’Keeffe’s photographs: “Arthur Wesley Dow: Nearest to the Divine,” which brings together the work of O’Keeffe’s influential mentor in New York; and “’What Next?’: Camera Work and 291 Magazine,” a collection of images from two seminal photography journals compiled to offer a snapshot of the artistic scene surrounding her and Stieglitz.
See more examples of O’Keeffe’s photography below.
Georgia O’Keeffe, Big Sage (Artemisia tridentata) (1957). © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum.
Georgia O’Keeffe, Ladder against Wall (1961). © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum.
Georgia O’Keeffe, Waiʻanapanapa Black Sand Beach (March 1939). © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum.
Georgia O’Keeffe, Road from Abiquiú (1959–66). © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum.
Georgia O’Keeffe, Garage Vigas and Studio Door (July 1956). © 2022 Georgia O’Keeffe Museum / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
Georgia O’Keeffe, Chama River (1957–63). © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum.
Georgia O’Keeffe, Ladder against Studio Wall in Snow (1959–60). © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum.
Georgia O’Keeffe, Skull, Ghost Ranch (1961–72). © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum.
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What does it mean to be an “American artist”? There are museums, galleries, and whole programs of study dedicated to the genre, but as with everything that seems black and white at first, it’s not so simple.
For the artist Raúl de Nieves, born in Michoacán, Mexico, the question of what it means to be American came to the fore of his mind in 2017, when he was preparing a major installation for that year’s Whitney Biennial. “Essentially, I’m showing in ‘the museum of American art’ and I’m from Mexican descent, but, you know, what does that mean today?” he asked in a 2017 interview with Art21. 
De Nieves came to the U.S. at nine years old with no warning and no suitcase. Today, his artwork—which encompasses densely adorned sculpture, installation, and performance—melds the two worlds in which he was raised. Many of his materials, colors, and forms fuse the aesthetics of traditional Mexican craft, queer club culture, and religious iconography.
Sculptures and stained-glass window by Raúl de Nieves. Photo: Henri Neuendorf.
For the Whitney Biennial, de Nieves created a room-engulfing stained-glass mural that traces an individual’s evolution from struggle and self-doubt to celebration. “The mural talks about this experience—this journey,” the artist said. “I feel really happy that I could put so much emphasis on this idea of ‘a better tomorrow’ in my artwork.”
De Nieves’s latest exhibition, on view at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston (through June 24, 2022), is in many ways an extension of the themes he explored in the Whitney Biennial project. “The Treasure House of Memory” includes a collage of tarot-inspired drawings, a painting of the legend of Saint George and the Dragon, and a series of beaded sculptures that trace the evolution of a human figure into a horse.
“Growing up in Mexico was really magical because I got to see a lot of forms of celebration,” the artist, whose father died at the young age of 33, told Art21. “I got to experience death as a really young child. That’s what my work is about: it’s like seeing the facets of happiness and sadness all in one place.”
This is an installment of “Art on Video,” a collaboration between Artnet News and Art21 that brings you clips of newsmaking artists. A new series of the nonprofit Art21’s flagship series Art in the Twenty-First Century is available now on PBS. Catch all episodes of other series like New York Close Up and Extended Play and learn about the organization’s educational programs at Art21.org. More

A forthcoming film starring Benedict Cumberbatch, The Electrical Life of Louis Wain, is reviving the reputation of a popular illustrator known for depictions of cats that captivated Victorian England—and the psychiatric hospital in southeast England where he spent his later days has mounted an exhibition of his work to coincide with the film’s release.
The eccentric artist’s feline fascinations are on view in “Animal Therapy: The Cats of Louis Wain” at Bethlem Museum of the Mind, which is housed within Bethlem Royal Hospital, the world’s oldest psychiatric hospital, in southeast England. The institution was a pioneer in recognizing the potential of animal therapy for its patients’ well-being.
Wain’s drawings were immensely popular a century ago, appearing in newspapers and children’s books as well as on greeting cards. When his mental health declined in old age, he was admitted to Springfield Hospital; so loyal was his following that when the public learned about his situation, he was moved to the “more salubrious” surroundings of Bethlem (as the hospital describes them), where he continued to draw and paint. The exhibition draws works from the museum’s holdings, as well as loans from a private collector.
“Animals have always been known for their affinity to man,” said Kate McCormack, the hospital’s senior dramatherapist, in the press release (which, uncharacteristic of announcements of museum shows, pronounces it “a gleeful new exhibition”). “At the Bethlem Royal Hospital, the Pets as Therapy program has helped forge relationships between service-users and dogs, notably a Siberian husky named Tess. From offering unconditional affection to aiding in confronting fears and phobias, pets can be a big part of a person’s recovery and journey to improved mental health. Animals can offer a very pure and unconditional relationship without demands or expectations.”

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The film treatment of the artist’s life, The Electrical Life of Louis Wain, directed by Will Sharpe, co-starring Claire Foy as Wain’s wife, Emily Richardson, and with voiceover by Olivia Colman, opens on New Year’s Day. The New York Times dubs the film “the cat’s meow,” describing Cumberbatch as “irresistible” and the script as “garrulous [and] lightly funny,” concluding that the film draws “a deeply human self-portrait.”
See Wain’s work and a film still here.
Louis Wain, Cats’ Christmas (ca. 1935). Courtesy Bethlem Museum of the Mind.
Louis Wain, Carol Singing Cats (ca. 1930). Courtesy Bethlem Museum of the Mind.
Louis Wain, I Am Happy Because Everybody Loves Me (ca. 1928). Courtesy Bethlem Museum of the Mind.
Louis Wain, Sweetness Coyed Love Into its Smile (ca. 1935). Courtesy Bethlem Museum of the Mind.
Louis Wain, Kaleidoscope Cats VI (undated). Courtesy Bethlem Museum of the Mind.
Still from The Electrical Life of Louis Wain, starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Claire Foy. Courtesy Studio Canal.
“Animal Therapy: The Cats of Louis Wain” is on view at Bethlem Museum of the Mind through April 13, 2022.
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