Amon Carter print details

Red Cannas

Georgia O'Keeffe (1887-1986)

Object Details

  • Date

    1927

  • Object Type

    Paintings

  • Medium

    Oil on canvas

  • Dimensions

    36 1/8 x 30 1/8 in.

  • Inscriptions

    Verso:

    u.c. on canvas in white paint: Georgia O'Keeffe \ 1927

    u.r. on stretcher in ink: Georgia O'Keeffe-1927-Red Cannas

  • Credit Line

    Amon Carter Museum of American Art, Fort Worth, Texas

  • Accession Number

    1986.11

  • Copyright

    Public domain

Object Description

By magnifying her botanical subjects, O’Keeffe transformed the traditional genre of still-life painting into something entirely fresh. She explained her reasoning for painting floral studies in this way: “I have painted what each flower is to me and I have painted it big enough so that others would see what I see.”

Her studies of plant life celebrate the dynamic colors and patterns found in nature and also commemorate her associations with people and places. She related the subject of red cannas with her husband, the photographer Alfred Stieglitz. The flowers blossomed in their garden at Lake George, a resort town in New York’s Adirondack Mountains where the Stieglitz family owned a summer house.

Additional details

Location: Off view
W28-artist-CMYK-CarterBlack
See more by Georgia O'Keeffe

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Educator Resources
  • How do artists use scale and proportion to create a unique composition?

    In what ways do color, line, and shape affect the mood of a work of art?

    How might a work of art, based on a natural object, compare to a scientific drawing of the same object?

  • All Levels

    Give students viewfinders, objects, pencils, and paper. They will use their viewfinders to focus on one part of an object. They will then sketch a close-up of that section on their paper so that they can practice looking at very small details.

    Take students outside to photograph nature using tablets or smartphones. Students should bring the lens very close to the object and look carefully to set up their composition before snapping a photograph.

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