New Mexico inspired many of Georgia O'Keeffe’s paintings after her first visit there in 1929.
O'Keeffe first visited New Mexico in the summer of 1929 and returned repeatedly during the following decades. She was drawn to the state’s distinctive landscapes, adobe buildings, bones, churches, and intense light. These subjects became central to her mature visual language.
She spent part of many summers in New Mexico while maintaining a life connected to New York. In 1949, three years after Alfred Stieglitz died, she moved permanently to the state. She lived in Abiquiú and later maintained a studio and home at Ghost Ranch.
New Mexico is sometimes confused with Arizona in discussions of Southwestern art, but O'Keeffe’s signature regional association is specifically New Mexico. Her paintings of the area are not ordinary travel illustrations; she simplified and enlarged forms to create highly personal compositions.