Abiquiu Sand Hills and Mesa

Arts of the Americas

1945

Georgia O’Keeffe (American, 1887–1986)

Although relatively small in scale, this long horizontal canvas conveys a striking sense of the panoramic views around Abiquiu, New Mexico. After visiting the area repeatedly, Georgia O’Keeffe bought a home there in 1945, and she painted this image of the sandy hills leading up to a massive flat-topped mesa the same year. The brilliant Southwestern light offered O’Keeffe immense visual clarity over many miles, and she translated her perception of distant geological formations—particularly the dark green mesa that dominates the top third of the composition—into an abstracted arrangement of stacked bands of color.

Status: Currently Off View
Department: Arts of the Americas

Artist: Georgia O'Keeffe
Title: Abiquiu Sand Hills and Mesa
Place: Abiquiu (Object made in)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1945
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 40.6 × 91.4 cm (16 × 36 in.)
Credit Line: Bequest of Paul and Gabriella Rosenbaum
Reference Number: 2002.74
Copyright: © Georgia O'Keeffe Museum/ Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Carnegie Institute, Painting in the United States, 1947, exh. cat. (Pittsburgh: Carnegie Institute, 1947), cat. 4.
Smith College Museum of Art,Paintings from Smith Alumnae Collections: An Exhibition Presented in Honor of Thomas Corwin Mendenhall on the Occasion of His Inauguration as Sixth President of the College, exh. cat. (Northampton, MA: Smith College Museum of Art, 1959), cat. 37.
Barbara Buhler Lynes, Georgia O’Keeffe: Catalogue Raisonné, vol. 2 (Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art; Abiquiu, NM: Georgia O’Keeffe Foundation; New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999), no. 1085.
Chad Alligood, et al.,The Beyond: Georgia O’Keeffe and Contemporary Art, exh. cat. (Bentonville, AR: Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, 2018), 119 (ill.).

New York, An American Place, Georgia O’Keeffe: Paintings, 1944,” Jan. 22–March 22, 1945, no cat. (not on checklist, listed by Doris Bry, as Abiquiu country).
New York, Downtown Gallery, Spring Exhibition, 1947, no cat.
Pittsburgh, Carnegie Institute, Painting in the United States, Oct. 9–Dec. 7, 1947, cat. 4.
Northampton, MA, Smith College Museum of Art, Paintings from Alumae Collections, Oct. 14–Nov. 18, 1959, cat. 37.
Milwaukee, The Center, Ten Americans, Sept. 21–Nov. 5, 1961.
New York, Hirschl & Adler Galleries, Six American Modernists, Nov. 9, 1991–Jan. 4, 1992.
Bentonville, AR, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, The Beyond: Georgia O’Keeffe and Contemporary Art, May 26–Sept. 3, 2018, no cat. no.; Raleigh, North Carolina Museum of Art, Oct. 13, 2018–Jan. 20, 2019 (Bentonville only).

Georgia O’Keeffe (1887–1986), New York and New Mexico, 1945 [O’Keeffe moved permanently to New Mexico in 1949]; sold to Paul (1897–1982) and Gabriella Rosenbaum (born Gabriella Kramer, 1905–2000), Chicago and Palm Springs, FL, 1967; bequeathed to the Art Institute of Chicago, 2002.

Lynes 1999 1085

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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