Georgia O'Keeffe spent her final decades in New Mexico. She first visited the state in 1929 and returned regularly before moving there permanently after Alfred Stieglitz died in 1946.
The state’s high desert, cliffs, bones, adobe buildings, and expansive skies became central subjects in her work. O'Keeffe lived and worked at Ghost Ranch and Abiquiu, developing a visual vocabulary associated with the region without simply painting conventional landscape views.
New Mexico is sometimes treated as a single period in her career, but her relationship with the state changed over time. Early visits inspired paintings made alongside her New York work; later, New Mexico became her main home and the setting for much of her daily life.