How did Arthur Wesley Dow influence Georgia O’Keeffe’s artistic development?

Arthur Wesley Dow played a pivotal role in revitalizing Georgia O’Keeffe’s career and shaping her artistic philosophy. After O’Keeffe became disillusioned with the traditional "imitative realism" taught in standard art schools, Dow’s Modernist approach provided the alternative she needed to return to professional art.1

Dow’s influence on O’Keeffe was defined by several key principles:

• Personal Expression: Dow taught that art should be a vehicle for an artist’s personal ideas and feelings rather than a mere imitation of the physical world.12
• Compositional Structure: He emphasized that these personal expressions were best visualized through the harmonious arrangement of three elements: line, colour, and notan (the Japanese system of balancing light and dark masses).12
• Direction Toward Abstraction: By rejecting academic copying, Dow’s teachings had a profound impact on O’Keeffe’s development, guiding her toward abstraction and a new approach to composition.2

O’Keeffe first encountered these ideas in 1912 through Dow’s colleague, Alon Bement, and later studied directly under Dow at Columbia University’s Teachers College in 1914.12