Most of my colleagues concur that the complexities of what has developed in American art, architecture, literature, music and photography since the 1890s cannot be limited to a certain framework of several decades within the 20th century, such as the 1890s to 1940, which I would refer to as Early American Modernism. Nor can it be limited to what was produced by American artists before, say, the 1960s, because artists continue to look and respond to the art of earlier decades, thus shaping their imagery within this broader context. Indeed, art evolves as a continuum, and certainly post-modernism, and the many modernisms evolving from it, including those that are current in art being produced today, have defined themselves in relationship to, or as a reaction against, the art of earlier decades.

We are still too close to what has gone on to set limits and boundaries on the meaning of American Modernism. As yet, there is no scholarly consensus about its meaning, and in sponsoring research that explores the broader conception of American Modernism, Research Center scholars are making important contributions to the dialogue and, thus, are enriching it. Moreover, Georgia O’Keeffe was active professionally as an artist from 1916 to 1984, and in 1970, when the Whitney Museum of American Art opened a retrospective exhibition of her work, she became the heroine of the feminist movement, thus positioning her in the limelight, which she had first enjoyed in the 1920s.  Whether or not artists working since then have liked or disliked her work, they acknowledge the fact that she established a place for women in an arena from which women had traditionally been excluded. The O'Keeffe Museum exhibition program seeks to situate O'Keeffe's achievement within the context of that of her contemporaries, and because of the significant role she played in creating a place for women in the art world, the program includes exhibitions of the work of men and women who are living artists of distinction.

Barbara Buhler Lynes
Curator, Georgia O’Keeffe Museum
Emily Fisher Landau Director, Research Center

Member News Summer 2007