O’Keeffe Paintings On Loan At New Britain Museum

NEW BRITAIN — Two works by Georgia O’Keeffe representing different and important periods in the artist’s career are now on loan to the New Britain Museum of American Art from the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, N.M. Both paintings will remain on view in the Stanley Gallery through March 7.

 “Trees in Autumn” was painted in the early 1920s at Lake George, N.Y., where O’Keeffe worked during the summer and fall from 1918 to 1929. It captures the intensity of the changing colors of the Lake George fall foliage and her fascination with fall as a season.

The second painting, “Mule Skull with Pink Poinsettia,” dates from 1936 and was completed in New Mexico where, beginning in 1929, O’Keeffe worked part of almost every year until 1949, where she made her permanent home.

According to O’Keeffe Museum, the painting includes four subjects that were treated as single elements in many of the artist’s earlier signature works. Those elements include abstractions (an area of blue and white to the left of flowers that appear in the painting), bones (a skull), flowers (Poinsettias), and landscape forms (the red hills surrounding O’Keeffe’s Ghost Ranch house in northern New Mexico).

The two works were lent in exchange for the New Britain Museum’s Georgia O’Keeffe painting, “East River from the 30th Story of the Shelton Hotel.” The 1928 painting is now part of an exhibition in Santa Fe.

Also on display at New Britain Museum of American Art, through December 31, is an exhibition entitled “The Imagination Highway: The Fine Art of Children’s Book Illustration.” The collection showcases 18 artists whose work represents the current children’s book illustrations.

The exhibition includes two original art works from recent books by each illustrator. Books are set up next to the art works so children can discover the entire story on the spot.

New Britain Museum of American Art, at 56 Lexington Street, can be contacted by calling 860/229-0257. Hours are Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday, noon to 5 pm; Wednesday, noon to 7 pm; and Saturday, 10 am to 5 pm.

Admission is $4 for adults, $3 for senior citizens, $2 for students, and free for children under 12. Free admission is granted to all visitors on Saturdays, from 10 am to noon. The museum is handicapped accessible.