Modernism Today
This week, I chose to take a look
the painting, “Grey Lines with Black, Blue and Yellow,” by Georgia O’Keeffe in
1923. O’Keeffe was known, artistically, for her paintings of exaggerated and enlarged
flowers but socially for her progressive and feminist beliefs. This piece, in
particular, really stood out to me because the painting resembles the female genitals.
While, at first, I thought I was seeing a phallic image in an innocent painting,
after doing more research on this piece, I found that I was wrong in doubting
myself. O’Keeffe intended for her painting of a flower to resemble female
genitalia to inspire conversations about the roles women played in society at
the time this painting was done. She was pushing the boundaries of what art
could mean and she wanted to share her opinions on a social issue that was
extremely prominent while she was alive.
Much like
when this painting was completed, women’s rights and the role women play in
society are pressing issues today. There are many areas in society today in
which women are still not being given fair opportunities to show their worth
and in some cases, women are not paid fairly for the work they do compared to
their male counterparts. Even the topic of what women have the rights to do to their
own bodies are heavily debated today. It is through paintings, such as the one
above, that O’Keeffe attempted to fight systems that discriminate against women,
for no reason other than the fact that they are women, and I doubt that she
ever thought the issues she faced would be so prominent in today’s society.
Hi Drew,
ReplyDeleteI like the painting of choice from this time period because I have not seen other blogs use this painting before and show a message that very much changed society today. The message of the blog, woman's rights, was clearly shown when you described the painting and detailed what is going on with woman's rights today. The connection with the painting and woman's rights was a very clear and important message that many people during the time needed to hear about.
Hey Drew, I thought you chose a very cool and meaningful painting on a topic that is still relevant to today. I like how you compared the severity of women's rights back then to today and how it is still relevant to today. I think you did a good job analyzing the painting and interpreting the message that the author intended. I think that a good painting is shown in its meaning and how easy it is to interpret the true meaning without having to do too much digging.
ReplyDelete