Which museum received Georgia O’Keeffe’s major 1946 retrospective, the first for a woman at that institution?

The Museum of Modern Art received Georgia O’Keeffe’s major 1946 retrospective, the first retrospective the institution devoted to a woman artist. The exhibition helped confirm her importance in American modern art.

The Museum of Modern Art, usually called MoMA, had opened in New York in 1929 and quickly became an influential institution for modern painting, sculpture, photography, and design. O’Keeffe’s retrospective surveyed work from different stages of her career.

By 1946, O’Keeffe was known for abstraction, flowers, city views, and New Mexico subjects. Presenting these bodies of work together made it possible to see the consistency of her formal interests across changing subjects.

The fact is sometimes misstated as her first museum exhibition. O’Keeffe had shown in galleries and museums earlier; the distinction concerns MoMA’s first retrospective devoted to a woman artist.