Agnes Martin's Relocation to New Mexico

Agnes Martin's Relocation to New Mexico

This article relates to I Am Agatha

In I Am Agatha by Nancy Foley, the protagonist is loosely inspired by the late Agnes Martin, a famed abstract expressionist painter who spent a period of her life in New Mexico, during which the story is set. In 1967, Martin stopped painting and left New York City, then disappeared from public view for 18 months before reappearing in northern New Mexico, where she lived as a hermit for nearly a decade, much like Agatha in the novel. Foley mentions in her author's note that she spent time in the same area during that period. "She built an adobe house at Mesa Portales and lived a hermit's existence for nearly a decade; during that same time, I spent much of my childhood visiting my grandparents in the house where my mother grew up, not far from where Martin was living."

Martin cited several reasons for her renunciation of art in the summer of 1967 and her departure from New York City. These included being informed that her beautiful studio would be demolished, receiving a grant large enough to buy a pickup truck and an Airstream camper, the death of her friend Ad Reinhardt, and the end of her romantic relationship with the Greek sculptor Chryssa Vardea-Mavromichali. Decades later, she explained, "I left New York because every day I suddenly felt I wanted to die and it was connected with painting. It took me several years to find out that the cause was an overdeveloped sense of responsibility."

After reemerging in 1968 at age 56 in New Mexico, she inquired about land for rent at a cafe and filling station. The manager's wife had a property available, leading Martin to move to a secluded mesa, 20 miles from the nearest highway, reached via dirt roads. She built a one-room adobe house by shaping bricks herself and crafted a log-cabin studio from trees she cut with a chainsaw.

After a six-year hiatus from creating art, she gradually returned to her work in 1971. In June 1974, she appeared in New York and asked her friend Arne Glimcher to come to New Mexico to see her work. According to a piece by Olivia Laing in the Guardian, "She invited Glimcher to come and view it, posting him a hand-drawn map, at the bottom of which she had scrawled, 'bring ice thanks Agnes.'" When he arrived, Martin showed him five new paintings, marking a departure from her grid-focused gray-and-white minimalist works of the 1960s, which were replaced by horizontal and vertical stripes and bands of very pale pink, blue, and yellow, such as Untitled #13. She continued in this mode for the next 30 years.

Martin remained in New Mexico for the rest of her life, and in 1992, she moved into a retirement community in Taos, New Mexico, "driving each day to her studio in a spotless white BMW, one of the few extravagances in a life still dedicated to extreme material simplicity." During this period, objects such as triangles, trapezoids, and squares returned to her art, as seen in Untitled #1. Martin continued to paint until her death and produced her last masterpieces a few months before her passing in 2004 at age 92. Laing recounts that in his memoir, Glimcher describes holding her hand, singing her favorite song, "Blue Skies," which they often sang together, noting that sometimes she'd join in from her bed: "Nothing but blue skies / From now on."

She wanted to be buried in the Harwood Museum's garden in Taos, near her donated paintings, but New Mexico law forbade it. After her death, a group scaled the adobe walls at midnight under a full moon, digging a hole under a tree and scattering her ashes from a gold-lined Japanese bowl. I Am Agatha is inspired by Martin's time in New Mexico, and this relocation of her resting place parallels Agatha's actions in the novel as she relocates Alice's daughter's grave to a place she feels is better fitting.

Martin's departure from New York to New Mexico marked a turning point in her career. Despite living a reclusive life, leaving the city where most artists thrive, Martin carved out a path that led to a memorable career and life that inspired many, including Nancy Foley.

Cuba, New Mexico, near where Agnes Martin built her home on Mesa Portales, by Thomson200

Filed under People, Eras & Events

This article relates to I Am Agatha. It first ran in the April 8, 2026 issue of BookBrowse Recommends.