Which teacher strongly influenced Georgia O'Keeffe's ideas about composition and abstraction?

Arthur Wesley Dow strongly influenced Georgia O'Keeffe's ideas about composition and abstraction.

O'Keeffe studied with Dow at Teachers College, Columbia University, in New York during the 1910s. Dow emphasized arranging line, color, and shape rather than simply copying visible objects. That approach gave O'Keeffe a framework for developing a more personal visual language.

The influence can be seen in her early abstract drawings and watercolors, which became increasingly independent from traditional representation. Dow's teaching helped her think of art as an arrangement of formal elements.

Dow was not O'Keeffe's first art teacher and did not serve as her New York gallery dealer. Those roles belong to different parts of her biography. His importance lies chiefly in the compositional ideas that encouraged her experimentation.