Georgia O'Keeffe spent her later years in New Mexico, where the state's mountains, deserts, adobe buildings, bones, and flowers became major subjects of her art. She first visited New Mexico in 1917 and returned repeatedly during the 1920s and 1930s.
O'Keeffe was especially drawn to the area around Abiquiú and Ghost Ranch. She later acquired a house in Abiquiú and maintained another home at Ghost Ranch. The stark landscapes gave her a setting very different from New York, where she had lived and worked for many years.
Her New Mexico paintings are often recognized by simplified forms, strong outlines, and intense color. She painted the landscape directly, but she also transformed observed objects into highly personal compositions. Animal bones, for example, became recurring motifs rather than simple documentary studies.
O'Keeffe moved permanently to New Mexico in 1949, three years after Alfred Stieglitz died. She lived there until her death in Santa Fe in 1986, making the state inseparable from her artistic identity.