Scalp Dance, Sioux
1845-1848
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
1985.66.438B
Tags
About this artwork
While he was in Europe, George Catlin received a commission to paint fifteen large canvases from King Louis Philippe of France, who had spent two years in the United States in the late 1790s. Inspired, perhaps, by the art he saw in French museums, Catlin produced the most carefully detailed and highly finished works of his career. Here, he turned a rough sketch from Fort Pierre in 1832 into a full-blown and dramatically lit spectacle.
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 ...