Alon Bement encouraged Georgia O'Keeffe to pursue art education at the University of Virginia. Bement was an influential art educator associated with Teachers College, Columbia University, and his ideas helped redirect O'Keeffe's career during the 1910s.
After studying in Chicago and New York, O'Keeffe worked as a commercial artist and teacher. She later took courses at Teachers College, where Bement introduced her to the teaching philosophy of Arthur Wesley Dow. Dow emphasized composition, design, and personal expression rather than strict imitation of nature.
O'Keeffe adopted those principles while teaching in Texas and Virginia. In 1915, she produced a breakthrough series of abstract charcoal drawings, then sent some of them to Alfred Stieglitz. Stieglitz exhibited them in New York, helping launch her professional career.
Bement is sometimes confused with Dow, who was the more direct source of the compositional theory O'Keeffe applied. William Merritt Chase was also one of her teachers, but he belonged to her earlier Art Students League training.