"The Black Place" was the name O'Keeffe gave to one of her favorite painting sites in New Mexico. It was a stretch of desolate hills that she said looked, from a distance, like "a mile of elephants." Over a period of fourteen years (1936–49), this place inspired a torrent of work in paint, pastel, and pencil. Most often, she featured the jagged juncture of two hills, as in this fairly abstract interpretation of the scene.
This image cannot be enlarged, viewed at full screen, or downloaded.
Open Access
As part of the Met's Open Access policy, you can freely copy, modify and distribute this image, even for commercial purposes.
API
Public domain data for this object can also be accessed using the Met's Open Access API.
This image cannot be enlarged, viewed at full screen, or downloaded.
Artwork Details
Use your arrow keys to navigate the tabs below, and your tab key to choose an item
Title:Black Place II
Artist:Georgia O'Keeffe (American, Sun Prairie, Wisconsin 1887–1986 Santa Fe, New Mexico)
Date:1944
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:23 7/8 × 30 in. (60.6 × 76.2 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Alfred Stieglitz Collection, 1959
Object Number:59.204.1
the artist (1944–59; on extended loan to MMA, 1949–59; her gift as part of the Alfred Stieglitz Collection to MMA)
New York. An American Place. "Georgia O'Keeffe: Paintings—1944," January 22–March 22, 1945, no catalogue (checklist no. 8).
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "1948 Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting," November 13, 1948–January 2, 1949, no. 105.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "20th Century Painters: A Special Exhibition of Oils, Water Colors and Drawings Selected from the Collections of American Art in the Metropolitan Museum," June 16–October 29, 1950, unnum. brochure (p. 9; permanent loan from the artist).
Dallas Museum of Fine Arts. "An Exhibition of Paintings by Georgia O'Keeffe," February 1–22, 1953, brochure no. 22.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Fourteen American Masters: Paintings from Colonial Times to Today," October 16, 1958–January 4, 1959, no catalogue.
Galerie des Beaux-Arts, Bordeaux. "Profil du Metropolitan Museum of Art de New York: de Ramsès à Picasso," May 15–September 1, 1981, no. 225.
Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art. "Landscape Painting in the East and West," April 19–June 1, 1986, no. 39.
Kobe City Museum. "Landscape Painting in the East and West," June 7–July 13, 1986, no. 39.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe: 1887–1986," November 19, 1988–February 5, 1989, not in catalogue (unnumbered checklist addenda).
Los Angeles County Museum of Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe: 1887–1986," March 30–June 18, 1989, not in catalogue.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "American Landscape Painting," April 4–August 13, 1989, no catalogue.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "14 Americans," July 16, 1990–January 2, 1991, no catalogue.
National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. "Modern Art and America: Alfred Stieglitz and His New York Galleries," January 28–April 22, 2001, unnumbered cat. (pl. 179).
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "Georgia O'Keeffe: Abstraction," September 17, 2009–January 17, 2010, unnumbered cat. (pl. 134).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Stieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O'Keeffe," October 13, 2011–January 2, 2012, no. 193.
Brooklyn Museum. "Georgia O'Keeffe: Living Modern," March 3–July 23, 2017, unnumbered cat. (fig. 173).
Bentonville, Ark. Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. "The Beyond: Georgia O'Keeffe and Contemporary Art," May 26–September 3, 2018, unnumbered cat. (p. 123).
William S. Lieberman inProfil du Metropolitan Museum of Art de New York: de Ramsès à Picasso. Exh. cat., Galerie des Beaux-Arts, Bordeaux. Bordeaux, 1981, p. 174, no. 225, ill.
Lowery S. Sims inProfil du Metropolitan Museum of Art de New York: de Ramsès à Picasso. Exh. cat., Galerie des Beaux-Arts, Bordeaux. Bordeaux, 1981, pp. 166–67.
Lisa Mintz Messinger. "Georgia O'Keeffe." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 42 (Fall 1984), pp. 54, 56–67, 61, ill.
Vera Graaf. "Georgia O'Keefes Leben." Du no. 5 (May 1987), pp. 28–29, ill.
Lisa Mintz Messinger. Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 1988, pp. 85–87, ill.
Michael Berry. Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 1988, pp. 90–91, ill.
Roxana Robinson. Georgia O'Keeffe: A Life. New York, 1989, pp. 477–78.
Doris Bry inGeorgia O'Keeffe, in the West. Ed. Doris Bry and Nicholas Callaway. New York, 1989, pl. 60.
Elizabeth Montgomery. Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 1993, p. 71, ill.
Lisa Mintz Messinger inThe Georgia O'Keeffe Museum. Ed. Peter H. Hassrick. New York, 1997, p. 41, ill.
Barbara Buhler Lynes. Georgia O'Keeffe: Catalogue Raisonné. New Haven, Conn., 1999, vol. 1, p. 683, no. 1081, ill.
Barbara Buhler Lynes with Russell Bowman. O'Keeffe's O'Keeffes: The Artist's Collection. Exh. cat., Milwaukee Art Museum. New York, 2001, p. 169 (app. 2: "Works Given to Institutions during the Artist's Lifetime").
Hunter Drohojowska-Philp. Full Bloom: The Art and Life of Georgia O'Keeffe. New York, 2004, ill. between pp. 376–77.
Lisa Mintz Messinger inStieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O'Keeffe. The Alfred Stieglitz Collection in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ed. Lisa Mintz Messinger. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2011, pp. 14, 205, 282, no. 193, ill. (color).
Isabelle Duvernois inStieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O'Keeffe. The Alfred Stieglitz Collection in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ed. Lisa Mintz Messinger. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2011, p. 193.
Georgia O'Keeffe (American, Sun Prairie, Wisconsin 1887–1986 Santa Fe, New Mexico)
1930
Resources for Research
The Met's Libraries and Research Centers provide unparalleled resources for research and welcome an international community of students and scholars.
The Met Collection API is where all makers, creators, researchers, and dreamers can connect to the most up-to-date data and public domain images for The Met collection. Open Access data and public domain images are available for unrestricted commercial and noncommercial use without permission or fee.
Feedback
We continue to research and examine historical and cultural context for objects in The Met collection. If you have comments or questions about this object record, please complete and submit this form. The Museum looks forward to receiving your comments.
The Met's engagement with art from 1890 to today includes the acquisition and exhibition of works in a range of media, spanning movements in modernism to contemporary practices from across the globe.