Work.

Uncertainty.

Risk.

Challenge.

Achievement.

I just finished rereading Laurie Lisle’s Portrait of an Artist: A Biography of Georgia O’Keeffe. The last chapter in the book is called “Shadows.” Each preceding chapter in the book was given a title based on the location in which O’Keeffe was working, so it made me wonder why the author chose this particular title.

Shadows … as a legacy … occur only in the moment.

O’Keefe’s work was entirely based on expression … vision. She painted and repainted subjects and settings over and over, challenging herself to see with increasing focus and depth … to achieve the simple distilled essence. She was rarely satisfied.

In the final chapter of the book, the author quotes Blanche Matthias, a friend of the artist, in her explanation of what inspired the painter, “She tries for more than her potentiality. Most of us only dream that perhaps we have one, and growl because family or daily grind of life keeps us from finding out about it.”

A young student of O’Keeffe’s described the careful consideration she observed, … “Everything is done with full attention. Even to the precise way she folded a silk scarf or a linen handkerchief. She’s not thinking of anything else. She’s right there folding that napkin. That’s the form she’s observing … One day we were walking out in the cliffs when everything seemed so – different. There’s something about that woman. It isn’t just charisma, and it isn’t just personality. I think it’s other levels of consciousness.”

O’Keeffe’s daily grind was her art. Her life was her art and her art, her life.

O’Keeffe continued, “Too much complaining and too little work. You have a chance to get what you want if you go out and work for it. But you must really work, not just talk about it.”

She was true to herself alone. Honest. Aggressive. Persevering. Strongly attentive and aware.

“I compare my existence to balancing on the thin, sharp blade of a knife where, I’ve decided, it is worth the misstep if I am enjoying myself.”

Her gospel was truth … “Even if you think it doesn’t count – and for some of you it may not – doing something that is entirely your own may be pretty exciting.”

O’Keeffe was fond of garlic and chile peppers. Bach and Monteverdi were played regularly in her home.

She lived.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Portrait and I’m sad that I’m finished. I will read it again, later … now, off to work.