Abercrombie, the only daughter of Opera singer parents, was born in Texas, and grew up in Germany, and Aledo, Illinois, before settling in 1916 in Hyde Park, Chicago, where she spent the rest of her life. Aledo and its hills, ruins, and trees—the distinctly midwestern landscape she adored most—remained a constant in her work. Abercrombie’s restrained palette and minimal compositions foreground her repeating imagery, which can be read as autobiographical puzzles that, when unscrambled, reveal a complicated, often tortured life, but one which begs examination and discussion. In typical poetic, tough, and funny form, when she spoke to Studs Terkel about attending her own 1977 opening, Abercrombie said she would “go out either in a blizzard or in a blaze of glory.”