Alfred Stieglitz

palladium or platinum-palladium print, tipped at the upper edge to the original paper mat, annotated 'Mrs. R. R. Young' by the photographer in pencil on the reverse, 1918; accompanied by the original black wood frame and backing with 'Geo. F. Of., Inc.' label (3)

Collection of Georgia O’Keeffe

To her sister, Anita O’Keeffe Young

Private Collection

Greenough 472

'The Female of the Species Achieves a New Deadliness: Women Painters of America Whose Work Exhibits Distinctiveness of Style and Marked Individuality,' Vanity Fair, July 1922, Vol. 18, p. 50

Barbara Buhler Lynes and Russell Bowman, O'Keeffe's O'Keeffes: The Artist's Collection (Milwaukee Art Museum and Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, 2001), p. 15 

This exceptional, lushly-toned palladium or platinum-palladium print is in generally excellent condition. As one would expect from Stieglitz, the modulation of the tones, and the balance of lights, mid-tones, and darks, are all exquisitely handled. The tones range from deep velvety black to clean creamy white. The midtones are a subtle, pleasingly bluish-green. Upon very close examination in raking light, there is a 2-inch diagonal scuff along the right edge. This is faint and almost appears to be a feature of O'Keeffe's jacket lapel. There is a pen-point-sized matte-deposit, likely original retouching, in the lower portion of O'Keeffe's jacket. A tiny pin-point-sized accretion of indeterminate nature is visible upon close examination along O'Keeffe's collar. The very thin margin edges are generally clean. The original thin paper mat is faintly age-darkened and soiled at periphery and on the reverse. When the mat is lifted, faint offsetting from the mat window is visible along the left, right, and lower edges of the photograph. On the reverse of the paper mat, the following is written by Stieglitz: 'Mrs. R. R. Young / 720 W. 171 St' [address crossed out]' and '$300.00' [crossed out]. Also on the reverse, 'Mrs R R Young / 601 W 113 St / Apt 12A' and various framers notations are written in an unidentified hand in pencil. There are a few scratches and dings to the thin black frame. 'Young' is written in pencil on the back of the frame board. The brown paper backing, with 'Geo. F. Of, Inc.' label, is soiled, creased, and torn at the edges.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Stieglitz’s earliest photographs of O’Keeffe from 1917 and 1918 demonstrate his fascination with her work, body, and soul.  The penetrating portrait offered here is one of several in which O’Keeffe poses in front of her drawing No. 15 Special (cf. Greenough 471-82, 494-98), a charcoal inspired by her visits to Palo Duro Canyon, Texas.  Now in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, No. 15 Special is currently on loan to the O’Keeffe retrospective at the Tate Modern, London.  Stieglitz included this portrait in his 1921 retrospective at the Anderson Galleries, an historic show that was seen by thousands of visitors in New York and featured some 40 photographs of O’Keeffe.  

While Stieglitz and O’Keeffe first met in 1915, it was not until the following year that Stieglitz became acquainted with her work and the two began an intensive and intimate correspondence.  Stieglitz’s increasing desire for O’Keeffe did not blind him to the importance of her art.  In April 1917, Stieglitz gave O’Keeffe her first solo exhibition and No. 15 Special was among the 23 works shown.  At the time of the opening, Stieglitz wrote to O’Keeffe, ‘I’m glad that your work is at 291 – when I’m with it it seems to prop me up – makes me forget so much that is hideous – and a deep reverence for something very wonderful invariably over comes me –‘ (10 April 1917, quoted in Greenough’s My Faraway One: Selected Letters of Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz, pp. 133-4).

The photograph offered here was originally in the collection of Anita O’Keeffe Young, O'Keeffe's sister and the well-known socialite and wife of railroad magnate Robert R. Young.  An enthusiastic collector of her sister’s art, Anita also acquired a few of Stieglitz's most poignant portraits of O'Keeffe and likely received the present photograph in the late 1920s.  Notations in Stieglitz’s hand on the reverse of the mat list the address of ‘Mrs. R. R. Young’ as ‘601 W 113 St,’ where the Young family resided at the time of the 1930 United States Federal Census.  The New York Social Register locates Anita and Robert shortly thereafter at 720 Park Avenue. 

The present photograph is further distinguished by its accompanying original frame, created by Stieglitz’s favored framemaker, George F. Of, whose label (inscribed ‘Young’ in pencil) is affixed to the frame’s paper-backing.  George Of worked with Stieglitz, Georgia O’Keeffe, and other artists in the Stieglitz circle from the 1910s through the 1940s. 

In Alfred Stieglitz: The Key Set, Sarah Greenough locates at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D. C., a palladium print and a gelatin silver print made from this negative (Greenough 472 and 473).  Greenough locates only two other prints of this image, both gelatin silver prints, in institutional collections: one at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; and the other at the Milwaukee Art Museum.  The present photograph is the only known print of the image in private hands.