Flowers in the desert: Sensuality and color fuse with natureThe paintings by the American artist Georgia O Keeffe (1887 1986) enthrall us with their expressive color and latent sensuality. Famous for her iconic paintings of calla lilies and irises seen in magnified close-up, O Keeffe painted not only flowers but also atmospheric images of Manhattan skyscrapers, sweeping desert landscapes and poetic, semi-abstract compositions akin to the color field painting of the 1950s and 60s. O Keeffe s great popularity and her outstanding position in American art are rooted not just in her pictures, but equally in her remarkable personality.The present volume traces the idiosyncratic path of O Keeffe s career, which took her from the circle of modernist artists and photographers around Alfred Stieglitz with whom she had a turbulent marriage in 1920s New York to an independent and legendary life in the wilds of New Mexico. Tenaciously overcoming serious illness and the obstacles presented by a male-dominated art scene, she became the first woman artist to be given a solo show at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1946.Richly illustrated with paintings by the artist, portraits taken by Alfred Stieglitz and contemporary photographs, this study in our Basic Art Series documents the most important phases in Georgia O Keeffe s lengthy life in art.About the series: Each book in TASCHEN s Basic Art series features: a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance a concise biography approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions"