Georgia O’Keeffe found the landscapes that defined her later art in New Mexico.
She first visited New Mexico in 1929 and returned repeatedly before making the state her permanent home after Alfred Stieglitz’s death in 1946. The region’s desert, mountains, adobe buildings, bones, and intense light became central subjects in her paintings and drawings.
O’Keeffe spent time in several New Mexico locations, including Abiquiú and Ghost Ranch. She often worked from carefully observed natural forms, but she enlarged or simplified them so that familiar objects became monumental images. Her New Mexico paintings include churches, cliffs, hills, animal bones, and flowers.
New Mexico is sometimes confused with Arizona because both states are associated with desert landscapes and Southwestern art. O’Keeffe’s particular connection was with northern New Mexico, especially the area around Abiquiú and Ghost Ranch. Her home and studio in Abiquiú are now preserved as a National Trust for Historic Preservation site.