On loan to The Met The Met accepts temporary loans of art both for short-term exhibitions and for long-term display in its galleries.
Mehkskeme-Sukahs, Blackfoot-chief, Tatsicki-Stomick, Piekann chief (Tableau 45)
After Karl Bodmer Swiss
Engraving by Jean-Alexandre Allais French
Not on view
@FBHYDE • Apr 5
The first paintings were a means to share information. They were used to commemorate historical events and news, and show where to find resources. To me, Bodmer’s portraits of Indigenous people and lifeways made in 1833–34 seem very clinical, posed in romanticized renderings reminiscent of botanical watercolors. Watercolor on paper was the ideal medium to document on the move: fast-drying, lightweight, portable, and archival. The portrait paintings and drawings would lay the groundwork for the most accurate aquatint prints made of Native people before the smallpox epidemic. One image could be reproduced multiple times to reach a wide audience. Prints were a relatively inexpensive way for the rest of the world to glimpse the strange and wondrous "New" world. In my mind, in a very real way, they are precursors to social media.
#frankbuffalohyde #aquatint #artinnativeamerica
—Frank Buffalo Hyde
(Onondaga Nation, Beaver Clan)
Artist
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