5 Contemporary Works in Tribute to the Language of Georgia O’Keeffe

Georgia O'Keeffe: Pioneer of American Modernism and Master of Monumental Flowers

Georgia O'Keeffe was a key figure in the development of 20th-century American modernism, best known for her distinctive gaze upon the natural world. Over more than seven decades of artistic practice, O’Keeffe built a significant body of work that explored barren landscapes, still lifes, and magnified floral details—deeply shaping the American artistic imagination.

O'Keeffe is universally recognized for her iconic large-scale flower portraits, created primarily between the 1920s and 1950s. Of the roughly 2,000 paintings she produced in her career, about 200 depict flowers. These works are marked by an intense, close observation of nature that the artist herself described as a way to force the viewer to pause and contemplate what would otherwise be overlooked: “I’ll paint what I see, what the flower is to me, but I’ll paint it big and they will be surprised into taking time to look at it—even busy New Yorkers will stop and see what I see in flowers.”

Her flowers are detailed and amplified to the point of filling the entire canvas, subtly suggesting the vastness hidden within nature itself. Emblematic works such as Oriental Poppies, the various versions of Red Canna, and Petunia No. 2 (considered her first major floral painting in 1924) clearly demonstrate her ability to express the complexity and intrinsic beauty of floral forms with striking visual power.

Initially, O’Keeffe’s flower paintings were interpreted symbolically, often with erotic and Freudian overtones, suggesting a representation of female sexuality—a theory widely publicized by her husband, Alfred Stieglitz. However, O'Keeffe categorically rejected such interpretations, insisting that her intention was solely to capture the aesthetic and sensory essence of the flower. She strongly advocated for an autonomous, female-driven reading of her work, inviting female friends and writers to offer alternative perspectives, free from the constraints of male-dominated criticism.

O’Keeffe’s floral works thus represent not only a technical innovation in American modern art but also a significant cultural step toward reaffirming women's interpretive autonomy. Through the magnification of detail, the subtlety of tonal transitions, and carefully balanced compositions, Georgia O’Keeffe transformed the flower from a simple decorative motif into a powerful symbol of deep observation, contemplation, and universal beauty.

Floral Dialogues

In contemporary art, the flower remains an inexhaustibly fascinating subject—a privileged medium for exploring the silent dialogue between realism and abstraction, so central to Georgia O’Keeffe’s vision. We have selected five floral artworks by artists featured on ArtMajeur that, through stylistic or conceptual affinities, evoke the refined visual universe of the American painter.

These pieces are arranged as a visual crescendo, an ascending journey that invites the viewer to dive ever deeper into the essence of the flower. Starting from forms still clearly recognizable and faithful to nature, we progress toward increasingly daring interpretations—where botanical detail gives way to pure chromatic and formal abstraction.

Splashes of Champagne (2021) Painting by Myroslava Denysyuk

5 Contemporary Works in Tribute to the Language of Georgia O’Keeffe

1. Splashes of Champagne (2021) – Myroslava Denysyuk

In this first step of our journey, we encounter Splashes of Champagne by Myroslava Denysyuk—an artwork that celebrates the romantic, fading beauty of a flower in the midst of its metamorphosis. The petals, soft and curled, appear to be slowly wilting, revealing the quiet poetry of impermanence. The pastel color palette, gently blended against a deep black background, creates a striking visual contrast that evokes the suspended silence often found in Georgia O’Keeffe’s floral compositions.

Although the painting still maintains a strong fidelity to the natural form of the flower, there is already a suggestion of transformation: the magnification of the subject, the close-up framing, and the obsessive attention to detail immediately recall O’Keeffe’s early experiments, influenced by Paul Strand’s photography. Like O’Keeffe, Denysyuk succeeds in transforming a flower into something more—an intimate, sensory, almost meditative visual experience.

This marks the ideal opening to our visual path, where the flower—still clearly recognizable in its wholeness—begins to slowly unravel into its formal elements, moving ever closer to that threshold where reality fades into the language of abstraction.

"Together" (2023) Painting by Maryna Muratova

Tulipe 02 (2023) Painting by Odile Faure

Organics 8 (2024) Painting by Evgeniya Bova

4. Organics 8 (2024) – Evgeniya Bova

With Organics 8, Evgeniya Bova leads us into the penultimate stage of this visual ascent—a place where the floral form almost completely loses its concrete identity, merging into a universe of sinuous lines and ethereal shades. This work is part of a series dedicated to the beauty of the plant world viewed in macro, from such a close perspective that the boundary between the real and the abstract begins to dissolve.

Here, nature is no longer described, but suggested: petals and leaves intertwine in a fluid and harmonious rhythm, composed of soft tonal transitions and almost choreographic compositions. The blurred edges, the absence of a defined focal point, and the delicate tones of pink, green, and sand evoke Georgia O’Keeffe’s more mature works, where the botanical subject becomes a pretext to explore color, form, and emotional resonance.

Like O’Keeffe, Bova uses intensified observation as a tool for transformation. The magnification of detail draws the viewer’s eye into the plant’s microcosm, abstracting it without ever fully abandoning its natural origin. The result is a contemplative, almost meditative painting—one that invites a sensory rather than descriptive experience.

"Mimosa de Paris" Forsythia (2024) Painting by Jchadima

5. Mimosa de Paris – Forsythia (2024) – JChadima

With Mimosa de Paris, JChadima leads us to the apex of our journey—where the flower is no longer depicted, but evoked through a radical synthesis of form, color, and movement. Nature is present as memory, as an initial impulse, but what we see is pure abstract orchestration: swirls, folds, and curves that suggest petals without retaining their botanical definition.

This painting originates from a photograph taken on a gray day during a visit to the Jardin des Plantes in Paris. It is from that muted light that the vibrant brilliance of the mimosa yellow bursts forth, radiating in the artwork like a promise of spring’s renewal and rebirth. Color becomes voice, and line dances within a fluid, sensual space.

The influence of Georgia O’Keeffe is unmistakable—not only in the symbolic and sensory origin of the subject but also in how JChadima reinterprets her visual language and pushes it further. Like O’Keeffe, he begins with close observation of the flower, only to liberate it from any mimetic constraints, sublimating it into a visual flow that touches on the very essence of organic abstraction.

His connection to the American master is also personal: JChadima was trained by artists close to her circle, absorbing an aesthetic that he now revisits through a contemporary lens. Mimosa de Paris thus represents the culminating point of our exploration: the flower as emotion, as abstract vital energy, as pure form. It is a quiet yet powerful tribute by a modern artist to Georgia O’Keeffe’s vision—one that taught us to see the invisible in the simplest details of nature.