Knee, Gina (American, 1898-1982). PHOTO PORTRAIT OF GINA KNEE, Circa 1929-1931, by an unidentified photographer. Gina Schnauffer Knee Brook, was born in Ohio and studied at Smith College. She moved to New Mexico in 1931 after seeing paintings of the Southwest by John Marin. There she met and married Ernest Knee, a Canadian photographer, and became a member of a group of artists known as The Rio Grande Painters. In 1942 she and her husband moved to California, where she became the personal photographer to Howard Hughes. Her painting moved from landscapes of the Southwest into abstractions influenced by the work of Paul Klee. She had exhibitions in NYC. After she left her marriage, she moved back to New Mexico, but also showed her work in a New York gallery. In New York she met and married Alexander Brook, the former husband of Peggy Bacon. They lived and worked in Georgia and on Long Island. She was an active and successful artist, exhibiting in New York and in New Mexico during the 1960s and 1970s.
