New Mexico became Georgia O’Keeffe’s main home after she moved permanently to Abiquiú in 1949.
O’Keeffe first visited New Mexico in 1929 and returned repeatedly during the following decades. She was drawn to its bright light, broad skies, adobe buildings, cliffs, bones, and distinctive desert forms. These subjects became central to some of her best-known paintings.
In 1945, she bought a house at Ghost Ranch, north of Abiquiú. Four years later, after Alfred Stieglitz died, she moved permanently to New Mexico. She later restored and lived at the historic Abiquiú house, which had a distinctive walled garden and a famous door she painted many times.
New Mexico is sometimes described as O’Keeffe’s sole artistic subject, but that is inaccurate. She also painted New York skyscrapers, Lake George scenes, flowers, shells, and other objects. New Mexico was nevertheless the setting most closely associated with her mature work.