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Charcoal on laid paper, 18 7/8 x 24 3/8 inches
CR No. 154
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125th Anniversary Acquisition. Purchased with the gift (by exchange) of Dr. and Mrs. Paul Todd Makler, with funds contributed by Mr. and Mrs. John J. F. Sherrerd, the Alice Newton Osborn Fund, the Lola Downin Peck Fund, and gift of The Georgia O'Keeffe Foundation, 1997
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A large, glowing white hill rises above a valley in this black, white, and gray composition. Several low, rounded forms fill the bottom of the valley. On the right side of the image, a dark cliff stands over the scene. Overhead, white clouds hover in a strip of dark sky.
CR No. 154
Title (1999 Catalogue Raisonné)
No. 15 Special
Source of title: Abiquiú Notebooks indicates lost inscription on original backing, "Back: 'No. 15 Special' – 1916 Back: star."
Alternate Title (1999 Catalogue Raisonné)
Special #15
Source of title: Downtown Gallery Archive.
Special No. 15
Source of title: Abiquiú Notebooks.
General Remarks
Not recorded Whitney Archive. Lost backing inscription and Abiquiú Notebooks date 1916. Completed after August move to Texas. Pictured in 1917 New York (291) Stieglitz installation photograph, see Appendix III, figure 6. O'Keeffe wrote: "When I lived in Canyon, Texas . . . Saturdays . . . We often drove the twenty miles to the Palo Duro Canyon. It was colorful –– like a small Grand Canyon, but most of it only a mile wide. It was a place where few people went unless they had cattle they hoped had found shelter there in bad weather. The weather seemed to go over it. It was quiet down in the canyon. We saw the wind and snow blow across the slit in the plains as if the slit didn't exist. The only paths were narrow, winding cow paths. There were sharp, high edges between long, soft earth banks so steep that you couldn't see the bottom. The made the canyon seem very deep. . . .We usually took different paths to the edge so that we could climb down in new places. . . .Those perilous climbs were frightening but they were wonderful to me and not like anything I had known before. . . .This drawing came months afterward from days like that. Sometimes these drawings were made long after the situations they come from" (Some Memories of Drawings [1988], unpaginated). See cat. nos. 135–53, 155–62. (Source: Lynes, 1999)
Inscriptions
Verso: "#3" (unidentified hand, graphite) (Source: Lynes, 1999)
Technique
Drawing
Materials
Charcoal on laid paper
Extended Medium Description
Charcoal on medium thick, cream, moderately textured laid paper; Watermark: INGRES PMF (ITALIA)
(Source: Paper Survey researched by Judith C. Walsh and published in Lynes, 1999.)
1917
1966
Amon Carter Museum of American Art
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFA H)
1966
1970–1971
Whitney Museum of American Art
Art Institute of Chicago
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA)
1987–1989
National Gallery of Art (NGA)
Art Institute of Chicago
Dallas Museum of Art
Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)
2016–2017
Georgia O'Keeffe Foundation, Santa Fe, NM; sold to PMA, 1997. (Source: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2025)
© Georgia O'Keeffe Museum
Version History
Core fields last updated 6/10/2026
Last verified by current collection Aug 06 2025
Source System ID
8313
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Conservation
Information is from the most recently submitted report, please contact the current owner to verify updated details.Information provided for Access O'Keeffe by Philadelphia Museum of Art in 2025.
Manipulations of the charcoal include smudging, erasing, and spray applied fixative, all of which are evident in the drawing.
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Georgia O'Keeffe. No. 15 Special, 1916–1917. Access O’Keeffe, Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, https://access-ok.okeeffemuseum.org/object/8313.