Georgia O'Keeffe's 1915 series of abstract charcoal drawings is known as Specials.
The drawings were created while she was teaching in South Carolina and represented a decisive break from the academic art methods she had studied earlier. Rather than copying visible objects, O'Keeffe used sweeping lines, geometric shapes, and tonal contrasts to explore visual feeling and structure. She sent some of the drawings to her friend Anita Pollitzer, who showed them to Alfred Stieglitz.
Stieglitz exhibited the drawings at his New York gallery in 1916. That display helped bring O'Keeffe to the attention of the American avant-garde. The series is sometimes confused with Stieglitz's Equivalents, his abstract cloud photographs, or with O'Keeffe's later flower paintings. Specials refers specifically to her early charcoal abstraction and marks a turning point in her career.