fe gave him an allowance from her share of her family’s brewery profits. With this, Stieglitz took budding artists and friends out tolunch, to help them out or gain connections for displays in 291. At first, the relationshipbetween him and O’Keeffe was innocent; a patron and artist, a student and teacher, orperhaps even a father and daughter. Stieglitz’s obviously paternalistic role could havebeen a substitute for the role Georgia’s father played early in her life. Alfred took care ofher by selling her works for the equivalent of a year’s living expenses, or other practicalneeds. O’Keeffe began to model for Stieglitz’s camera, and an enormous portfolio ofbreathtaking nude photography emerged after many years of accumulation. Of course,Alfred’s wife Emmy did not find it particularly breathtaking to come across the pair in themiddle of a sitting. Georgia had not been the first woman the older man had had an affairwith, and this time his marriage was over for good.Stieglitz and O’Keeffe cohabited cramped New York City studio apartments, mostoften occupying separate beds. They had a strange relationship which consisted of similarintellects, much stubborn and violent argument, and an artistic partnership where each fedoff the other’s creativity. Many biographers suggest that they were simply togetherbecause it was convenient and mutually beneficial, and they had few emotional ties. Afterall, why would a woman who had such lesbian tendencies suddenly attach herself to a manof such strong personality who seemed to dominate her? Stieglitz was a demandinghypochondriac who always needed care, right up to his dying day. Theirs was an unusualunion, and after he passed on, Georgia continued her life in earnest.This is far from the entire volume of Georgia O’Keeffe’s lifetime. It was a long,frequently lonely life, even when she was surrounded by people. She chose to...
