Ends Of Barns 1922

Curator: Oh, look, “Ends of Barns” from 1922 by Georgia O'Keeffe. The way she plays with those architectural forms is quite something, isn’t it? Oil paint on canvas. Editor: Striking. Stark. Makes me feel like I'm standing in a vast, silent field, all geometry and muted colors. There’s almost something melancholy about it. Curator: It's fascinating how she isolates these farm structures, presenting them almost as monumental forms. You see this tendency across modernism; it's connected to the social upheavals and transformations from rural to industrial America. Editor: Right, the way she crops the scene, eliminating unnecessary detail. It transforms utilitarian buildings into abstract shapes, echoing those anxieties and new viewpoints that she held. I like the simple colour palette; what did the colours represent? Curator: Precisely, focusing instead on the core geometries. There's also a distinct relationship between architecture and industry to consider. Look at her choice to bring out the shapes instead of any life at all. The barns are these simplified masses... what could be living within those buildings? We don’t know! Editor: Very true; O’Keefe removes signs of human activity or sentimentality. Everything's very clean and sharp; not how you'd find your everyday barn! Almost unnaturally tidy! Did the public relate to it at the time, do you think? Curator: I suspect people were ambivalent. On the one hand, it’s a clear move to the artistic avant-garde; on the other, it might speak to a nostalgic desire to escape modernity altogether by going to such desolate places and painting them as if they hold all the mystery of a secret lover. Editor: Ha! Secret lovers in a barn! I think her capacity to transform and redefine, to offer us those intimate architectural interactions, really, sums it up for me. Curator: An unforgettable artistic perspective, certainly. It speaks to our present and reflects something important from our collective past.