Which 1916 Georgia O'Keeffe works helped establish her reputation as an abstract artist?

Georgia O'Keeffe’s 1916 charcoal drawings helped establish her reputation as an abstract artist.

O'Keeffe made a series of highly simplified charcoal drawings in 1915 and 1916 while teaching in South Carolina and Texas. Instead of directly depicting recognizable objects, the works used lines, curves, and rhythmic forms to explore sensations and ideas. They were among the earliest wholly abstract works produced by an American artist.

A friend sent some of the drawings to Alfred Stieglitz, who exhibited them at his New York gallery 291 in 1916. O'Keeffe initially objected to the display because she had not authorized it, but the exhibition brought her work to the attention of the modern-art community.

These drawings are often overshadowed by her later flower paintings. They were not charcoal studies preparing for a single flower composition; they represented a major conceptual turn toward abstraction. O'Keeffe continued to move between abstraction and recognizable subjects throughout her career.