Georgia O’Keeffe’s Life

Considered one of the greatest artists of the 20^th century, O’Keeffe was born in Wisconsin. She spent time in Virginia and at the Art Institute of Chicago, developing her artistic skills and a new form of abstraction.

Some of her work found its way to the photographer Alfred Stieglitz, the first to show her artwork at a gallery. Alfred later became her husband. She quickly became known for her images of New York skyscrapers and very colorful flowers.

While living in New Mexico, O’Keeffe’s painting style changed shortly after that, and she produced some of her most famous pieces. Paintings featuring the desert terrain. She began suffering from macular degeneration (declining eyesight). Georgia painted her last oil painting in 1972, but she later enlisted the help of assistants to create still more art, inspired by images in her memory and imagination. In her lifetime O’Keeffe produced hundreds of works of art and lived to be 98!

Project # 1 | Collaborative Portrait Poster

I always find it fascinating to make art of famous artists who make artwork of others or other things. When I was creating my collaboration posters of renowned artists, I had to make one of O’Keeffe.

My collaborative poster of Georgia O’Keeffe is a fun way to either start a lesson or end a unit of study about Georgia O’Keeffe. The final collaborative poster (pictured below) is approx.  35″ x 42″ when complete.

The poster comprises 30 pieces, each fitting on regular 8.5″ x 11″ paper. To do one of my posters, each child gets one piece of the overall poster to color and cut out.

Then the pieces get assembled. When the pages come together, they get their “aha” moment when they see the iconic artists Georgia O’Keeffe looking back at them.

Some teachers like to tell their students who they will be creating, and others want to keep the surprise until the end. This is my preferred method because kids have so much fun figuring out “who” it is as they work.

Options: There are two poster variations included in my resource. The first (described above) is excellent for any age group as it requires that the children color the pages of the poster.

The second poster variation is designed for secondary grades or upper elementary classes. It creates an easy way (for teachers) to create a grid portrait of O’Keeffe where each child draws their portion of the poster and works together to line up their pieces so that the final image works. Art teachers teach grid drawing all the time. This poster option is designed to save time and remove a lot of the prep of teaching O’Keeffe’s grid portrait lessons.

You can see my complete Georgia O’Keeffe Collaboration Poster HERE.

Project # 2 | Meet the Master Artist: Georgia O’Keeffe

With my Meet the Master Artist series, you can let your students make art inspired by master artists AND learn art history at the same time. These aren’t comprehensive art history courses, of course, but they are a great introduction to each artist.

My meet the master artists will save you time and help you teach your students about O’Keeffe. This Georgia O’Keeffe project includes a video that I have created to teach your students about the O’Keeffe. This video coincides with a one-page biography sheet of her as well. Also, and perhaps the best part, these lessons are levels, so you can easily differentiate among your students. I have included a beginner, intermediate, and advanced set.

To do this lesson, children will cut out two pages and attach them. The top page has a picture of Georgia O’Keeffe (that I have drawn) and a short biography of her. The second page provides room for children to draw large “zoomed in” flowers like she did.

The final display, as I’m sure you will agree, is stunning!

You can see my Meet the Master Artist: Georgia O’Keeffe project HERE.

Project # 3 | Georgia O’Keeffe Unscramble FREEBIE Email Sign up!

I love to spoil educators who sign up to be on my email list. I like to do so by sending exclusive freebies, tips, and tricks, as well as special announcements. When you join today, I’ll email you a free copy of my artist resource to start using right away.

This freebie is a great activity that you can use right away to teach about Georgia O’Keeffe. Not to mention. After you join, you’ll get invited to my “Subscribers Library” of freebies.

Project # 4 | Large 3D Flowers

When you think of O’Keeffe, probably one of the first things that come to mind is large flowers! Try making large paper flowers with your students as I did with mine. 

Project # 5 | Paint a Painting

Years ago, my husband and I created a vast oil painting greatly inspired by one of Georgia’s paintings. It was also inspired by the time we spent in Santa Fe, surrounded by the sky, mountains, and plants. The same landscape that inspired Georgia. Here is our painting:

This is something you can always do with your students. Have your students either re-create a famous painting (masters have done this for years) or use parts of a famous painting to inspire something new like we have done.

Project # 6 | Large Format Flowers

You can also do large-format Georgia O’Keeffe flowers using pastels.

I have written an entire post with all the instructions on how to do this HERE.

Project # 7 | Books about Georgia O’Keeffe

I rarely teach a lesson to my students without incorporating books in one form or another.

I always have books available for students to look through and read when they finish an art project. When I can work it in, I like to read to my students while they are working. Reading to them as they make their work seems to calm them.

The following list of books are ones that I have used and enjoy. Please know that the following images (and links attached to them) are affiliate links to Amazon (see disclosure HERE).

Thanks for reading and doing these Georgia O’Keeffe art projects with your students!

Jenny K.

Art with Jenny K. LLC is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com.