The Shell

1934

Georgia O'Keeffe

Artist, American, 1887 - 1986

Drawn with charcoal on parchment-white paper, the tightly coiled spiral of a shark eye shell nearly fills this rectangular drawing. The jagged opening of the shell is at the lower right, and the shell curves up and to our left, counterclockwise, into a tight spiral at the center. The wider planes of the outer layers are shaded silvery gray, and they darken to black at the center. A thin shadow is suggested by a soft rim of charcoal around the edges of the shell.
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Artwork overview

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

(The Downtown Gallery, New York, N.Y.) Dorothy Braude Edinburg, Boston, 1955; gift to the National Gallery of Art, 1978.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1978

  • Master Drawings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art and Promised Gifts, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1978, p. 120.

1985

  • "Georgia O'Keeffe: Works on Paper," Museum of Fine Arts, Museum of New Mexico, Santa Fe, September 14 - November 17, 1985, no. 29

1986

  • Graphics Survey Exhibition, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., October 1986.

1999

  • "Georgia O'Keeffe: The Poetry of Things," The Phillips Collection, Washington, April 17 - July 18, 1999, as Shell.

2000

  • "O'Keeffe on Paper," National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., April 9 - July 9, 2000. Traveled to: The Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, Santa Fe, July 29 - October 29, 2000, p. 50-51, no. 45. (Exhibited at both venues)

Bibliography

1999

  • Lynes, Barbara Buhler. Georgia O'Keeffe: Catalogue Raisonné. 2 vols. New Haven and London, 1999, no. 827.

2000

  • Fine, Ruth et al. O'Keeffe on Paper. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC; Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, Santa Fe, 2000: no. 45.

Watermarks

MBM (FRANCE) INGRES d'Arches

Wikidata ID

Q64571669

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