Every artist has favorite subjects that they wish to paint or draw or sculpt. One of the greatest gifts of any talented artist is to be able to look at a subject and capture the essence of it and put it on canvas. When looking at historical figures, museum pieces and faded illustrations from the past, it is wonderful to be able to see an image on canvas or sketch pad that reflects disjointed bits and pieces of history. An artist, with a love of history can often capture the past and truly bring it to life for others to be able to envision a life, a time or a style gone by.
Historical events that are described in journals, novels or military records are ripe for the imagination but when those are combined with knowledge of architecture, landscape, costume and setting of the period, the artist can take each of those elements and combine them to create a breathtaking piece of history. In turn, an artist sets the stage for the imagination by creating the images in his or her own way. Some of the artists of the 16th, 17th, 18th and 19th century left us with a window to the past through their renderings. Champlain's drawings of Native Americans were seen through his eyes. The figures were line drawings, woodcuts without color and without backgrounds. The "savages" were unknown groups or individuals that, to the mind of the early artist/explorer were without a past, without a connection to something familiar. In this case, the art reflected what was in the mind of the explorer, the unknown.
Other artists, such as John White who was with the colony at Roanoke Island, left a very vivid, colorful series of renderings that were full of life, dance, drama, bright colors and flavor. White obviously spent some time making observations, getting to know his subjects and of course, he had the talent to put them into more realistic perspective. Our collective vision of that era is based a lot on what we see in John White's art. The village scene has been used over and over again throughout the centuries in depicting what a woodland stockaded village looked like. White had a control on his art that others of the period did not.
Thomas Davies, a military historian left us with another series of colorful images of the Great Lakes Indians. In his renderings, we often see the small Native family or even the lone Indian in the foreground on a tiny spot of land or rock outcrop with the overpowering effects of Niagara Falls or other large bodies of water as the main subject of his painting. The details in the human subjects are certainly not lacking. If you look closely at one or more of his Native families, the women appear to be bare breasted, albeit covered with the cotton trade shirt they are holding. In many of his renderings the Natives are depicted with their backs to the artist. These nameless, faceless individuals are again the artists view of the big world of wonder. He sees the colorful "savages" but doesn't get to know them as individuals, yet some are shown with their children lingering about, they are still a relatively unknown entity to the artist. Davies was clearly impressed with the power of the falls, the depth and magnificence of the Great Lakes but truly didn't see the Native people, especially the women as anything but players in a largely colorful new world.
George Catlin, George Winters and Charles Bird King and to some degree, James Otto Lewis spent a great deal more time and found connections with the Native people of the 19th century woodlands and prairies. George Catlin was a trained attorney but found his passion was art and Indians. He traveled extensively in North and South America painting many portraits of numerous Indians and making notes and creating a huge record of Native American culture. His artistic style, with the long heavy brush strokes is known widely and is easily spotted by anyone even remotely interested in Native American historical portraits. Catlin, favored the North American Indians over the more remote cultures of South America and he was particularly fascinated and taken with the Mandans of the Upper Missouri River. He knew their culture was different from other surrounding tribes and he did an extraordinary number of renderings while he was there. He made very detailed descriptions of these people and he was still left wondering who they really were.
George Winter, a very young Englishman had a dream to capture on canvas, the vision of the Indians of the Wabash before they were gone forever. Winter stayed in Indiana during 1837-38 with the Miami and Potawatomi and managed to draw and paint dozens of portraits and landscapes while he was here. The Potawatomi were removed later in 1838, and Winter was even present for official historic meetings where the sole purpose was to discuss the removal of these marvelous people from their homes to a place unknown to them. Winter stayed in the home of white captive, Frances Slocum on the Mississinewa, a tributary of the Wabash and made several portraits of her, her family and friends. When Winter didn't have time to spend in the field, he made quick sketches and took notes so that he could finish these later in his studio.
Charles Bird King was a far more skilled artist than Winter and he still could not get all the details in his renderings correct. What appear in the colorful portraits to be insignificant and non-descriptive points of color on someone's head or face, turn out to be paint, in very specific designs of tribal and cultural affiliation. Other items that were created in a triangular or trapezoidal shape left the viewer puzzled. These shapes turned out to be cut birds beaks attached to the headgear of the wearer. King's efforts are, for the time, as were Winter's and Catlin's priceless, but the fact that these men, although men of their time, still lacked the true intimacy with their subjects.
James Otto Lewis, left us dozens of renderings of "male" Indian participants at treaty negotiations in the Wabash Valley. He did not draw or paint even one female that was present or even a child. The art is of the same caliber as Winter's and his presence at these historical events left us with precious visions of who these people were and what they looked like, however, the artist left so many opportunities to really see these people, slip through his fingers. The times he lived in dictated that since his time and abilities were limited and probably supplies, as well, he must sketch and paint the most "important" figures of the period --the men.
With all of those portraits and many others, we still lack a true historical view of the Native Woodland Indians and the landscapes of history of the Eastern Frontier. Thanks to the modern artist with all of their skills and technologies available to help them, there is still hope to be able to capture the look, the feel and mood of the early history of our country.
By taking authentic museum pieces such as trade shirts, breechclouts, moccasins, bags, knife sheaths, sashes, leggings and silver ornamentation, journals, military records, archeological evidence, and combine that with what we do see in other period renderings -- it is possible to get visual images of events and people that otherwise had been overlooked. Reading these bits of historical evidence, the artist can put pen to paper or brush to canvas and illustrate for a modern audience, what no one could do before.
Not only do we see the material culture held in museums but we can learn how things were used from evidence produced by scientists in laboratories after examining textiles and plant seeds found in conjunction with copper or pottery. The artist then puts this sample of textile into the form of a skirt based on references to hemp skirts being worn in an earlier era mentioned by someone such as Moravian Missionary, David Zeisburger. The image on paper is that of a young girl wearing a hand woven skirt of plant fibers harvested from local "weeds." This information transforms the image we have of the Native people because of the artist.
A skilled artist can capture a moment in time, in a very personal way, just by using the stroke of his brush or the line from his pen. An artist can bring inanimate objects to life, bring a face to a people or create a vision of a standing forest where now a small town sits along that same river.
Sheryl Hartman is the author of "Natives Along the Wabash" and works with Steve "Slick" Tucker on a variety of projects connected to history and Piankeshaw Trails. They have another book planned and some travel projects planned for this fall. If you want more information on Steve and his art, contact him: [http://www.slickart.org] or if you want to get a copy of the book he illustrated, go to [http://www.wabashnatives.com]
