Bella Donna 2
By Georgia O'Keeffe, 1939
Get up close to this painting and the flower almost stops looking like a flower at all. Georgia O'Keeffe blew up a single white bloom until it swallowed the whole canvas, its petals curling and folding in soft waves of gray and cream. At the very center sits a pool of deep teal and blue, drawing your gaze straight into the heart of the flower. Only a thin band of blue sky at the top reminds you that anything else exists beyond those petals.
O'Keeffe made her name in the 1920s with these giant flowers, and her thinking behind them was refreshingly down to earth. She noticed that most people barely glanced at flowers, so she decided to paint them big enough that no one could walk past. "I'll make even busy New Yorkers take time to see what I see of flowers," she said. Plenty of people have tried to read secret meanings into her blossoms over the years, but she usually brushed those readings aside and said she was simply painting what she saw.
Painted in 1939, Bella Donna 2 shows how well she could turn a common subject into something quiet and a little unreal. The pale grays and whites lend the petals an almost velvety softness, while that flash of teal at the core keeps pulling your eye back. It is a calm, uncomplicated work that gives more the longer you sit with it.