Georgia O'Keeffe

A renowned charcoal and watercolor artist, and, after 1946, the widow of photographer Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O'Keeffe (1887-1986) lived and worked reclusively in a remote desert area of New Mexico for nearly 40 years before her death. Here in 1966, as a young Life magazine photographer, Loengard spent three days with O'Keeffe, photographing with grace and simplicity her chosen environment-a collection of rattles from snakes she had killed with a walking stick, the bleached cattle skulls seen in some of her paintings, the artist herself gardening resolutely in a hardscrabble plot or taking long walks over a brooding desert expanse at twilight. A re-editing of the original Life photo-essay in this slim but richly produced volume attests glowingly to O'Keeffe's enduring prestige, Loengard's status as a camera artist and the cultural eminence of photography itself. (Apr.)