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October 9–13, 2025 | Taos, NM
What does it mean to choose solitude—not as escape, but as devotion?
Georgia O’Keeffe and Agnes Martin both turned to the quiet of New Mexico to shape their work—O’Keeffe through the wide silence of Abiquiú, Martin through the disciplined stillness of line and form. Each carved space for a kind of interior listening.
Stillness Study is a retreat for those drawn to that same depth: solitude not as absence, but as a fertile ground for clarity, perception, and creative renewal.
Over five days in the high desert of Taos, we’ll move through visits to O’Keeffe’s home and Ghost Ranch, a guided conversation on Martin’s philosophy, and reflective practices designed to invite slowness, spaciousness, and artistic return.
This is a space for those called to quiet intensity—the ones who feel something sacred at the edge of retreat, who are ready to reorient toward the self as source.
Space is limited: 10 participants.
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Taos has long drawn artists seeking something beyond the noise—something elemental. In the high desert of northern New Mexico, Georgia O’Keeffe and Agnes Martin found not just quiet, but clarity.
Both artists left New York at the height of their careers—not in retreat, but in pursuit. O’Keeffe had been immersed in the energy of the New York art scene, married to Alfred Stieglitz, and surrounded by acclaim. But it was the desert that called to her. After her first trip to New Mexico in 1929, she returned nearly every summer for two decades before permanently relocating to Abiquiú. There, she painted the same hills, bones, and adobe forms again and again—not out of repetition, but reverence. Solitude, for O’Keeffe, was a way of seeing more clearly.
Agnes Martin, too, found early success in New York, even exhibiting alongside the Abstract Expressionists. But in 1967, at the peak of her visibility, she walked away. She gave up her studio, disappeared from the art world for several years, and eventually resettled in Taos. Her life became one of quiet rhythm and spiritual rigor. For Martin, solitude was not escape—it was discipline, devotion, and the only condition under which true inspiration could emerge.
While the two never met, their paths mirrored one another. They each turned inward and westward—leaving the art world’s center to live on their own terms. They made space for stillness. And from that stillness, they made enduring work.
Today’s creatives are up against a different kind of noise.
It’s the hum of Slack notifications, the scroll of inspiration that never ends, the pressure to make everything shareable. The algorithm is always watching, and somewhere along the way, stillness became a luxury instead of a given. Even rest starts to feel performative. Solitude, real solitude, is harder and harder to access.
This retreat is a deliberate interruption.
Stillness Study invites you to step away from the pace of productivity and plug back into something quieter, deeper, and more sustaining. It explores the role of solitude in creative life through the lens of Georgia O’Keeffe and Agnes Martin—two artists who each chose to leave the noise of New York behind and build a life shaped by silence, space, and presence.
Solitude isn’t just about being alone—it’s about how we shape our inner and outer worlds in its presence. The retreat explores how O’Keeffe and Martin embraced solitude as both a necessity and a creative force, using it to sharpen perception, deepen focus, and create with clarity.
This experience is for those drawn to quiet intensity, expansive landscapes, and the rhythms of solitude. Through time in nature, guided reflection, and creative exploration, we’ll consider how solitude influences perspective, process, and artistic devotion.
Rather than isolating, solitude—when approached with intention—becomes a container for creative renewal, presence, and deep listening. We’ll spend time with the landscapes that shaped O’Keeffe and Martin, reflect on their artistic practices, and explore our own relationship to solitude—whether through structured space or unstructured wandering.
This is an intimate, reflective retreat. Days will be spacious but intentional, balancing group dialogue, independent exploration, and quiet immersion in the landscape. We’ll close with a conversation on how to carry the lessons of solitude forward, integrating them into our daily lives.