Georgia O’Keeffe’s first widely recognized abstract series was called Specials.
The Specials are a group of works associated with O’Keeffe’s early experiments in abstraction during the 1910s. They developed from her interest in reducing visual experience to simplified forms, lines, and tonal relationships rather than depicting objects in a traditionally descriptive way.
The title is sometimes overlooked because O’Keeffe’s better-known series include flowers, animal bones, and New Mexico landscapes. The Specials belong to an earlier period, when her work was helping introduce American audiences to a new visual language.
O’Keeffe did not abandon recognizable subjects permanently. She later returned repeatedly to flowers, buildings, bones, and landscapes, often enlarging or simplifying them so that they could function both as subjects and as abstract compositions.