O'Keeffe's painting underwent a basic change in the early 1940's toward greater abstraction. "It is surprising to me to see how many people separate the objective from the abstract. Objective painting is not good painting unless it is good in the abstract sense. A hill or a tree cannot make a good painting just because it is a hill or a tree. It is lines and colors put together so that they say something. For me that is the very basis of painting. The abstracted is often the most definite form for the intangible thing in myself that I can only clarify in paint."

During the later years her subjects - a door, bones, a bit of ground or sky - become more abstract. First they deal with light and shadow but later evolve into light-filled, dazzling, near-complete abstraction. These light-filled works are her last before macular degeneration, after the age of 80, caused her to turn to works in clay. She died in 1986.

 

Bibliography:

"O'Keeffe's O'Keeffe: the artist's collection" / Barbara Buhler Lynes with Russell Bowman; New York: Thames & Hudson, 2001

"Becoming O'Keeffe: the early years" / Sarah Whitaker Peters; 1st Ed., New York: Abbeville Press, c1991

"Georgia O'Keeffe at Ghost Ranch: a photoessay" / John Loengard; 1st Ed., New York: Stewart, Tabori and Chang, c1995