Sammlung: Florine Stettheimer

Letting people have your paintings is like letting them wear your clothes - Florine Stettheimer

Florine Stettheimer (August 29, 1871 – May 11, 1944) was an American painter, designer, Jazz Age saloniste and poet. With her sisters, Carrie and Ettie, she hosted a salon for modernists in Manhattan, which included Marcel Duchamp, Henry McBride, Carl Van Vechten and Georgia O'Keeffe. She confined most exhibitions of her own work to these gatherings, occasionally submitting work to the Society of Independent Artists. Cushioned by family resources, Stettheimer refrained from self-promotion and considered her painting "an entirely private pursuit". She intended to have her works destroyed after her death, a wish defied by her sister Ettie, her executor.

For a long time
I gave myself
To the arrested moment
To the unfulfilled moment
To the moment of quiet expectation
I painted the trance moment
The promise moment
The moment in the balance
In mellow golden tones . . .
Then I saw
Time
Noise
Color
Outside me
Around me
Knocking me
Jarring me
Hurting me
Rousing me
Smiling
Singing
Forcing me in joy to paint them . . .

Florine Stettheimer