Pipestone Quarry on the Coteau des Prairies
1836-1837
Medium
Painting
Classification
Painting
Department
Smithsonian Collection
Museum
Smithsonian American Art Museum
Credit
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Mrs. Joseph Harrison, Jr.
Accession Number
1985.66.337
Tags
About this artwork
George Catlin made this sketch in 1836, when he made his well-documented journey to the Pipestone Quarry in today’s Minnesota, where Plains Indians harvested the red steatite to make their pipe bowls. He was not the first white man to visit the sacred quarry, but he was the first to record its appearance. He wrote of the journey and the site: “For many miles we had the Coteau in view in the distance before us, which looked like a blue cloud settling down in the horizon . . . On the very top of t...
About the Artist
George Catlin · 1796–1872
George Catlin (1796–1872), born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, to Putnam Catlin and Polly Sutton—who had been captured by Native Americans during the 1778 Battle of Wyoming—initially pursued a legal career. Trained at Litchfield Law School, he was admitted to the bar in 1819 but abandoned law after two years to study art in Philadelphia in 1823. Self-taught as a portraitist, Catlin quickly gained ...