Georgia O’Keeffe received the first retrospective exhibition for a woman artist at the Museum of Modern Art in 1946. The exhibition recognized the breadth of her career and established her as a major figure in American modern art.
A retrospective differs from a single-gallery show because it surveys an artist’s development across many years and bodies of work. O’Keeffe’s presentation could therefore place her abstractions, flower paintings, city images, and other subjects within one larger artistic history.
The date is sometimes misremembered because O’Keeffe had already been exhibiting publicly for decades, including her influential 1916 presentation at Alfred Stieglitz’s 291 gallery. The 1946 MoMA exhibition came shortly after Stieglitz’s death and helped mark a new phase in O’Keeffe’s public career. She continued working for decades afterward.