Georgia O'Keeffe, c. 1919

Alfred Stieglitz conceived of composite portraits of individuals that would consist of hundreds of photographs made over a lifetime. His most complete such portrait is of Georgia O'Keeffe and comprises over 300 finished photographs. The present nude stands out as one of the most extraordinary elements of this composite portrait. In order to obtain the soft backlighting, Stieglitz had O'Keeffe stand on a board on a radiator in front of a white curtain against a window. The diffused backlighting subtly reveals the curves of the body delineating the form like sculpture. In 1914, with the help of Marius de Zayas, Stieglitz mounted at his galley "291" what he called the first exhibition anywhere of African sculpture presented not for its ethnographic interest but as art. This rare waxed palladium print depicts Georgia O'Keeffe, whose work Stieglitz would show shortly thereafter in a series of exhibitions in 1916 and 1917, holding one of the African sculptures that had been exhibited.