Georgia O'Keeffe's Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1 sold for $44.4 million in 2014. The Sotheby's sale made it the most expensive artwork by a female artist sold at auction at that time.
The 1932 painting presents a large white jimson weed flower against a dark background. Its monumental scale and simplified form show O'Keeffe's method of enlarging natural subjects so viewers had to confront their shapes and structure.
The buyer was Walmart heiress Alice Walton, who purchased the work for the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. The sale attracted broad attention because it highlighted the historical underrepresentation of women artists in major auction records.
The record was not permanent. Later auction sales by women artists surpassed it, including works by Louise Bourgeois and others. The 2014 figure remains an important benchmark in O'Keeffe's market history, but it should not be described as the all-time record for a woman artist today.