Who photographed Georgia O'Keeffe in the famous 1920s portraits that shaped her public image?

Alfred Stieglitz photographed Georgia O'Keeffe in the famous 1920s portraits.

Stieglitz, a leading American photographer and modern-art promoter, first encountered O'Keeffe’s charcoal abstractions in 1916. He exhibited her work at his New York gallery, 291, and began photographing her in 1917. Over the following years, he made hundreds of photographs of O'Keeffe, including portraits, nudes, and close studies of her hands and clothing.

The photographs helped create a powerful public image of O'Keeffe as a modern, independent artist. They also attracted interpretations that she did not always accept. O'Keeffe and Stieglitz married in 1924, and their relationship was both personal and professionally significant, although she increasingly insisted on being understood through her own art.

Stieglitz is sometimes remembered mainly as O'Keeffe’s husband, but he was also a major figure in introducing European modernism to American audiences. His galleries and periodicals supported artists including Paul Cézanne, Pablo Picasso, and Henri Matisse.