Georgia O'Keeffe began living permanently in New Mexico in 1949. She had first visited the state in 1929 and returned repeatedly, especially during summers, before making it her permanent home after Alfred Stieglitz died in 1946.
New Mexico supplied subjects that became central to her mature work: desert hills, adobe buildings, crosses, animal bones, and immense skies. She lived and worked in Abiquiu and later maintained a home at Ghost Ranch, north of Santa Fe. These places were not simply scenic backdrops; O'Keeffe treated their shapes and colors as distinctive visual forms.
Her move is sometimes dated loosely to the late 1940s because she began arranging her life there before 1949. The specific year generally given for her permanent relocation is 1949, when she left New York and established her main residence in New Mexico.