Cada uno de los cuadros mostrados en las sucesivas exposiciones de la pintora durante los años veinte en Nueva York eran una suerte de autorretrato
https://elpais.com/cultura/2021-05-01/alfred-el-marido-de-okeeffe.html
ESTRELLA DE DIEGO / El País / Mayo 5, 2021 / OCA|Fuente externa
Cuando faltan sillas las mujeres tenemos que irnos al sofá. Le ha ocurrido a la presidenta de la Comisión Europea en una escena memorable. Su compañero, el presidente del Consejo Europeo, la dejaba sentarse retirada, mientras él sonreía para la foto desde la poltrona de honor. Desde luego, la principal culpa de ese destierro no era del anfitrión, sino de quien no se sentaba en el sofá también. Y hubiera dado igual que el desterrado fuera hombre o mujer. Cualquiera que tuviera internalizado lo improcedente de las exclusiones, hubiera podido evitar su propio ridículo. También se llamaría tacto, o cuidados, como se dice ahora en ese afán absurdo de renombrarlo todo. La presidenta, ha confesado, se sintió sola y me pregunto cuánto poder necesita tener una mujer para no sentirse sola, para no acabar siendo la excepción de una forma u otra.
Pensaba en esta soledad extraordinaria que a menudo sentimos las mujeres mientras recorría la exposición de Georgia O’Keeffe en el Thyssen. En ella se suceden sus líneas de color que, decían, eran su cuerpo, una feminidad abstracta que desbordaba el lienzo, se transformaba... Y, de tanto oír la historia, los ojos del espectador iban descubriendo piernas, muslos, caderas... donde sólo aparecían líneas y colores. Así que, en el fondo, cada uno de los cuadros mostrados en las sucesivas exposiciones de la pintora durante los años veinte en Nueva York eran una suerte de autorretrato. La artista se convertía en obra. El mundo era percibido de manera diferente por hombres y mujeres.
La pintora Georgia O'Keeffe posa con su marido, Alfred Stieglitz, en una imagen sin datar. BETTMANN / BETTMANN ARCHIVE Aunque para la pintora norteamericana por excelencia confundir esas formas que brotaban en ella sin saber bien desde dónde con su cuerpo era un modo de sentirse sola, de acabar sentada en el sofá de la historia, del cual hace apenas unos años se ha levantado. El culpable del malentendido era su marido, Alfred Stieglitz, fotógrafo y agitador cultural, cuya fama ha sido eclipsada por la de la mujer entre el gran público. No solo la fotografió y exhibió desnuda —con el consentimiento de la pintora, por cierto—, sino que describió a su joven descubrimiento y después su mujer de una forma también carente de tacto: “Por fin una mujer sobre el papel. Una mujer que se entrega”.
A O’Keeffe le molestaban los comentarios a su obra propiciados por este malentendido. Le molestaba que vieran en su obra corporeidades insinuándose, que requerían ser cubiertas para no ofender la sensibilidad del espectador. De modo que un día se largaba a Nuevo México, si bien manteniendo la buena relación con el marido. Y se ponía a pintar el desierto, hojas, flores, igual que tantas pinturas de flores solo hace poco recuperadas en grandes museos como el Prado. Tampoco allí, en el desierto, dejó de ser un mito, convertido su viaje en busca de América —bastante reiterado desde la década de 1920 entre artistas y poetas— en una rebeldía feminista. Es imposible adivinar cuántas veces se sintió sola más allá de saberse solitaria.
Alfred, O'Keeffe's husband
Each of the paintings shown in the successive exhibitions of the painter during the twenties in New York were a kind of self-portrait
https://elpais.com/cultura/2021-05-01/alfred-el-marido-de-okeeffe.html
ESTRELLA DE DIEGO / El País / May 5, 2021 / OCA | External source
When there are no chairs, women have to go to the sofa. It has happened to the president of the European Commission in a memorable scene. Her partner, the President of the European Council, let her sit away from her, while he smiled at her picture from her chair of honor. Of course, the main fault of that exile was not the host, but who did not sit on the sofa as well. And she would have given the same if the exile was a man or a woman. Anyone who had internalized the inappropriateness of the exclusions could have avoided her own ridicule. It would also be called tact, or care, as they say now in that absurd eagerness to rename everything. The president, she has confessed, felt lonely and I wonder how much power a woman needs to have in order not to feel alone, so as not to end up being the exception in one way or another.
She thought of this extraordinary loneliness that women often feel as she toured the Georgia O'Keeffe exhibition at the Thyssen. In it her lines of color that, they said, were her body, an abstract femininity that overflowed the canvas, was transformed ... And, from hearing the story so much, the viewer's eyes were discovering legs, thighs, hips ... where only lines and colors appeared. So, deep down, each of the paintings shown in the successive exhibitions of the painter during the 1920s in New York were a kind of self-portrait. The artist became a work. The world was perceived differently by men and women.
The painter Georgia O'Keeffe poses with her husband, Alfred Stieglitz, in an undated image.BETTMANN / BETTMANN ARCHIVE Although for the North American painter par excellence, confusing those forms that sprung up in her without knowing well from where with her body was a way of feeling alone, of ending up sitting on the sofa of history, from which she has just risen a few years ago. The culprit of the misunderstanding was her husband, Alfred Stieglitz, a photographer and cultural agitator, whose fame has been eclipsed by that of the woman among the general public. He not only photographed her and exhibited her naked —with the consent of the painter, by the way—, but he described her young discovery and later her wife in a way that was also lacking in tact: “At last a woman on paper. A woman who gives herself ”.
O'Keeffe was annoyed by her comments on her work prompted by this misunderstanding. She was annoyed that they saw in her work her bodies insinuating themselves, which needed to be covered so as not to offend the viewer's sensitivity. So one day she was leaving for New Mexico, while maintaining a good relationship with her husband. And she began to paint the desert, leaves, flowers, just like so many flower painters only recently recovered in large museums like the Prado. Nor there, in the desert, did she cease to be a myth, turning her journey in search of America - quite repeated since the 1920s among artists and poets - into a feminist rebellion. It is impossible to guess how many times she felt alone beyond being lonely.
