May 20, 2010 - Sale 2215

Sale 2215 - Lot 258

Price Realized: $ 3,480
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 5,000 - $ 7,500
STIEGLITZ, ALFRED (1864-1946)
Ida O'Keeffe with birthday cake. Silver print, 3 1/2x4 1/2 inches (8.8x11.4 cm.), on the original mount, with Ida's notations "Photo by Alfred Stieglitz at Lake George on my birthday, 1924, Ida," in pencil, on mount verso. 1924
Set Alert for Similar Items

Additional Details

From the estate of Ida O'Keeffe; to the present owner.

A print of this image is in the National Gallery of Art's Key Set, #1040 (1949.3.591) [209 A].

Alfred Stieglitz, The Key Set, Volume Two 1923-1937, 606.

Throughout the 1920s, Stieglitz's summers were spent at Lake George, a community nestled in the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York. It was there he photographed a private life he shared with family and friends, including Georgia O'Keeffe, whom he married in 1924--the summer these photographs were created--and her younger sister, Ida.


Stieglitz's photographs of Ida are intimate studies that capture her at unique moments. Pictured with her birthday cake, Ida's face is aglow, softly illuminated with a radiant quality of light. Shown with a rifle, presenting her quarry, she appears happy and self-satisfied. Photographed in a boldly patterned dress, she shyly turns away from the camera whereas holding a sprig of flowers her expression is direct and sweet.