In drawings like this, O'Keeffe asserted her independence from her traditional art training. Filling large sheets of paper with bold strokes of charcoal, her compositions evoke the growth and movement of nature through abstract forms. Here, the image is divided into three parallel sections. On the right, meandering lines suggest a flowing river or a rising flame. Four rounded bulbs in the center recall a rolling hillside or densely foliated trees, while the jagged line at left, accentuated by erasure marks, alludes to mountain peaks or a flash of lightning. The power of these early drawings was not lost on Alfred Stieglitz, who immediately offered to show Drawing XIII and other O'Keeffe charcoals in an exhibition at his gallery 291 in 1916.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Drawing XIII
Artist:Georgia O'Keeffe (American, Sun Prairie, Wisconsin 1887–1986 Santa Fe, New Mexico)
Date:1916–17
Medium:Charcoal with erasing on paper
Dimensions:24 3/8 × 18 1/2 in. (61.9 × 47 cm)
Classification:Drawings
Credit Line:Alfred Stieglitz Collection, 1950
Object Number:50.236.2
the artist (1915–50; on extended loan to MMA, 1949–50; her gift as part of the Alfred Stieglitz Collection to MMA)
Anderson Galleries, New York. "Alfred Stieglitz Presents One–Hundred Pictures, Oils, Watercolors, Pastels, Drawings by Georgia O'Keeffe, American," January 29–February 10, 1923, no catalogue.
New York. An American Place. "Beginnings and Landmarks: "291," 1905–1917," October 27–December 27, 1937, no. 65 (as "Drawing No. 39").
Art Institute of Chicago. "Georgia O'Keeffe," January 21–February 22, 1943, no. 2 (as "Charcoal Drawing").
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "Pioneers of Modern Art in America," April 9–May 19, 1946, no. 115 (lent by An American Place).
Museum of Modern Art, New York. "Georgia O'Keeffe: An Exhibition," May 14–August 25, 1946, no catalogue (checklist no. 3; as "Drawing No. 11").
Fort Worth. Amon Carter Museum of Western Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe: An Exhibition of the Work of the Artist from 1915 to 1966," March 17–May 8, 1966, unnumbered cat. (p. 27).
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. "Georgia O'Keeffe: An Exhibition of the Work of the Artist from 1915 to 1966," May 28–July 3, 1966, unnumbered cat.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "American Paintings, Drawings and Watercolors from the Museum's Collections," October 1–December 7, 1969, no catalogue.
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe," October 8–November 29, 1970, no. 3.
Art Institute of Chicago. "Georgia O'Keeffe," January 6–February 7, 1971, no. 3.
San Francisco Museum of Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe," March 15–April 30, 1971, no. 3.
New York. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. "Twentieth-Century American Drawing: Three Avant-Garde Generations," January 23–March 21, 1976, no. 21.
Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden. "Amerikanische Zeichner des 20.Jahrhunderts—Drei Generationen von der Armory Show bis heute," May 27–July 11, 1976, no. 15.
National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. "Georgia O'Keeffe: 1887–1986," November 1, 1987–February 21, 1988, no. 4.
Art Institute of Chicago. "Georgia O'Keeffe: 1887–1986," March 5–June 19, 1988, no. 4.
Dallas Museum of Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe: 1887–1986," July 31–October 16, 1988, no. 4.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe: 1887–1986," November 19, 1988–February 5, 1989, no. 4.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe: 1887–1986," March 30–June 18, 1989, no. 4.
San Antonio. Marion Koogler McNay Art Museum. "O'Keeffe and Texas," January 27–April 5, 1998, no. 3.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "American Drawings (1900–1950): Selections from the Permanent Collection," October 25, 2005–April 23, 2006, no catalogue.
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe: Abstraction," September 17, 2009–January 17, 2010, unnumbered cat. (pl. 21; as "No. 13 Special," 1916–17).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Stieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O'Keeffe," October 13, 2011–January 2, 2012, no. 177.
Museum of Modern Art, New York. "Georgia O'Keeffe: To See Takes Time," April 9–August 12, 2023, unnumbered cat. (pl. 39).
Waldo Frank, Lewis Mumford, Dorothy Norman, Paul Rosenfeld, and Harold Rugg, ed. America and Alfred Stieglitz: A Collective Portrait. Garden City, N. Y., 1934, pl. XXA, as "Abstraction," 1915.
Henry Geldzahler. American Painting in the Twentieth Century. New York, 1965, pp. 129–30, ill.
Charles Child Eldredge. "Georgia O'Keeffe: The Development of an American Modern." PhD diss., University of Minnesota, 1971, pp. xii, 24, 238, fig. 9.
Sam Hunter and John Jacobus. American Art of the 20th Century: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture. New York, 1973, p. 81, fig. 133.
Milton W. Brown et al. American Art: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, Decorative Arts, Photography. New York, 1979, p. 433, pl. 61, calls it "Drawing No. 13" and dates it 1916.
Patterson Sims. Georgia O'Keeffe: A Concentration of Works from the Permanent Collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art. Exh. cat., Whitney Museum of American Art. New York, 1981, p. 17, ill.
Lisa Mintz Messinger. "Georgia O'Keeffe." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 42 (Fall 1984), pp. 5–6, 9, 59, fig. 1.
Lisa Mintz Messinger. Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 1988, pp. 13–15, 17, 19, fig. 1.
Michael Berry. Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 1988, p. 38, ill. p. 12.
Georgia O'Keeffe. Some Memories of Drawings. Ed. Doris Bry. Albuquerque, 1988, pp. 39–41, 97–98, pl. 7.
Anita Pollitzer. A Woman on Paper: Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 1988, ill. n.p., as "Special No. 13".
Barbara Buhler Lynes. O'Keeffe, Stieglitz, and the Critics. Ann Arbor, Mich., 1989, p. 322 n. 24, as "Special No. 13".
Charles Child Eldredge. Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 1991, pp. 20–21, ill., as "Special No. 13".
Elizabeth Montgomery. Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 1993, pp. 20–21, ill.
Maria Costantino. Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 1994, p. 151.
Barbara Buhler Lynes. Georgia O'Keeffe: Catalogue Raisonné. New Haven, Conn., 1999, vol. 1, p. 98, no. 157, ill., as "No. 13 Special".
Lisa Mintz Messinger. Georgia O'Keeffe. London, 2001, pp. 21–22, fig. 6.
Peter-Cornell Richter. Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz. New York, 2001, p. 43, ill.
Barbara Buhler Lynes with Russell Bowman. O'Keeffe's O'Keeffes: The Artist's Collection. Exh. cat., Milwaukee Art Museum. New York, 2001, p. 169.
Kathleen Pyne. Modernism and the Feminine Voice: O'Keeffe and the Women of the Stieglitz Circle. Berkeley, 2007, pp. xx–xxi, 250–51, fig. 151, as "No. 13 Special," 1916–17.
Lisa Mintz Messinger inStieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O'Keeffe. The Alfred Stieglitz Collection in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ed. Lisa Mintz Messinger. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2011, pp. 14, 194–95, 277, no. 177, ill. (color).
Rachel Mustalish inStieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O'Keeffe. The Alfred Stieglitz Collection in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ed. Lisa Mintz Messinger. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2011, p. 194.
Barbara Buhler Lynes inO'Keeffe and Moore. Ed. Anita Feldman. Exh. cat., San Diego Museum of Art. San Diego, 2023, pp. 170, 174, fig. 1 (color).
Samantha Friedman. Georgia O'Keeffe: To See Takes Time. Exh. cat., Museum of Modern Art, New York. New York, 2023, pp. 18, 24, 170, colorpl. 39.
Laura Neufeld in Samantha Friedman. Georgia O'Keeffe: To See Takes Time. Exh. cat., Museum of Modern Art, New York. New York, 2023, p. 37.
Georgia O'Keeffe (American, Sun Prairie, Wisconsin 1887–1986 Santa Fe, New Mexico)
1925
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