Georgia O'Keeffe: The Brightness of Light

“My first memory is of the brightness of light, light all around,” said Georgia O’Keeffe, the pathbreaking 20th century artist and feminist heroine whose canvases altered the American art scene with bold, sensuous depictions of nature.   

On February 8 at 4 PM, a captivating new documentary, Georgia O’Keeffe: The Brightness of Light, is screening for free at Cornwall Town Hall in Cornwall, CT. It is directed by Academy Award-winning director Paul Wagner, narrated by Hugh Dancy, and featuring Claire Danes as the voice of O'Keeffe. With rare authority it explores the life and legacy of this pioneering artist, from her early years in the Midwest to her rise in New York’s vibrant art world, and finally to the remote deserts of New Mexico. 

This “mother of modernism” startled the New York 1920s art scene with groundbreaking paintings of flowers, bones, and the splendor of the natural world. Denying that her work was sexual imagery, she also posed nude for controversial photographs taken by Alfred Stieglitz, the art dealer and renowned photographer who would eventually become her husband. He was the first to exhibit her work in 1916.

The film traces the evolution of an artist whose work blurred the line between abstraction and realism. O’Keeffe’s enduring influence on modernism, her bold defiance of artistic convention, and her years in the vast solitude of the Southwest are brought to life in this rich, meditative journey.

O’Keeffe biographer Roxana Robinson, who appears in the film, will conduct a Q&A discussion of it afterwards and signed copies of Robinson’s biography will be available for sale. A reception will follow at the Cornwall Library next door.

Registration is required at The Cornwall Library website, and space is limited. Running time of the film is 1 hr 58 min.