Georgia OKeeffe, Abstraction

A painting is fully experienced only through direct contact. A photograph might give an indication of what a particular canvas looks like, but not what it is or, more crucially, what it does. Subtleties in surface and scale, especially, are lost or muddled in reproduction. Who hasn’t been wowed by a picture in a catalog or online only to be disappointed when the thing is encountered in the flesh? I was reminded of the limits of photographic reproduction, as well as those it benefits, while viewing “Georgia O’Keeffe: Abstraction,” an important but vexing exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

An O’Keeffe flower painting, seen as a poster in a friend’s apartment a few years back, gave me pause: The composition was impeccably considered, the contours precisely calibrated, space softly stated yet abrupt in impact and the palette an impressive range of near-monochromes. ...

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