Georgia O'Keeffe: The New York Years

O'Keeffe's New York City is a living organism, a breathing giant. The artist's radiant skyscrapers, streetlamp-lit nocturnes and river views celebrate a city capable of transcending crime and grime. Her Gotham period (1916-1932) began with Kandinsky-like abstractions and moved on to quasi-erotic images, cosmic eggs, semi-abstract natural forms, and barns and birches of upstate Lake George. With 91 color plates, this magnificent, oversize album completes a three-volume series begun with One Hundred Flowers and In the West. In his thoughtful essay, Dijkstra ( Idols of Perversity ) argues that O'Keeffe was no mystic but a humanistic realist who expressed the beauty of sensory experience. He also charts her break with husband-photographer Alfred Stieglitz's idealized concept of the feminine. Bry is the author of two monographs on Stieglitz; Callaway, director of Callaway Editions, is a specialist on O'Keeffe and Stieglitz. (Oct.)