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A comparison of american indian culture to european culture
Western native american tribes
Native American Cultural Assessment Project
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Another example of how art represented in the Native North America exhibit is a painting by David Paul Bradley, a Chippewa artist, titled Greasy Grass Premonition #2. It depicts a scene from the Battle of Little Bighorn, but the tombstone explains that Native Americans know it as the Battle of Greasy Grass Creek. By providing that information for the audience, the MFA is allowing them a glimpse into the minds of Native Americans and their culture instead of presenting it as another example of Western bias.
The painting itself is an incredible combination of colors, texture, and style. The scene includes a line of general white warriors all dressed identically in the foreground. They wear military clothing appropriate for the timeline of the Great Sioux War of 1876, including white gloves, a brimmed hat, and an ascot. The military men are
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Their body proportions are realistic, and while not many details can be seen in their faces, one assumes it is proportionally based on the size of the facial hair and outline of the eyes. The naturalism lends the foreground of the painting a quality of "realness" especially when compared with the slightly more cartoonish depiction of the thought bubble hovering over the military men's heads. The figures depicted in the thought bubble are much less realistic to the military men. Some of the thought bubble characters are Native Americans, some are the enemy they fight. Many colors are used in contrast to the solemn blue of the military men. The Native Americans are portrayed with feathers in their hair, brandishing guns or spears while atop a horse. The white enemy wears blue uniforms similar to those of the men in the foreground of the
At the start of the war, many people, including president Abraham Lincoln, thought that the few battles wouldn’t turn into much and that the fighting would be over soon. Clearly, they were wrong. As the fighting continued, uniforms became necessary in order to stop men from shooting others on their own sides. When uniforms were first created, they were very inconsistent in the way they were made. Styles of clothing depended on where they were made or who made them. Many s...
In order to study and understand American Indian art, one must also be familiar with their customs and beliefs. Many of the artworks have fabulous stories behind them that were crucial in forming the Native American culture. For these people, culture and art go hand in hand and is therefore impossible to know one without the other. The same is true for almost any other kind of artwork. In order to really appreciate a work of art one must have background knowledge of the society who formed and shaped it.
A old sandy color bridge is cast upon the middle of the painting, which is crumbling apart and crashing into the water. The water in this painting is dark blue and white showing the choppiness of the water. In the middle of the painting is a white statue with its head broken off, but still standing, holding a black shield leaning forward towards the center of the painting. In the background fire and gray and black smoke cover the landscape. The gray skies linger over the town with a dark depressing tone. While the river banks are roaring with fire. In the lower center of the painting is a woman dressed in white jumping to off the river bank with a warrior behind her. In the lower portion of the painting ships are on fire. Throughout the whole painting you will see thousands of people, some enemy warriors some townspeople. The enemy warriors are wearing red. While the townspeople are dressed in typical daily life clothing
This photo was taken to represent the Modoc War and the intelligence of the Modoc Braves that was greatly underestimated. The Modoc war was also known as the Modoc Campaign. The U.S. Army needed a photographer to capture the images of the war between the two forces. They hired the photographer who was famous at the time for capturing movement on film, Eadweard Muybridge and titled the photograph of this particular photo “A Modoc Brave on the War Path.” The U.S. Army also could not get an action shot of a Modoc warrior without endangering the life of he photographer so, they hired the Native American in the image, which means he is not a Modoc warrior. Muybridge was the lead photographer for the early part of the war in the early 1870’s and the location of the war was held to the Northeast side of California.
... in a common effort that contributed to protest activities. The photograph also uses tension to portray the two conflicting ideologies. There is visible tension between the guardsmen and the protestors; the guns represent war and violence while the flowers represent peace, love and nature. The National Guardsmen also look very uneasy while the protestors look content and comfortable. The union of the two creates tension in this photograph because they are so meaningful alone, making this photograph a very iconic image of the time.
Of the millions of cowboys,trappers and mountain men camped out in the rugged mountains and long plains of Montana, very few were artists. Even fewer had a dream as big and ambitious as Charlie Russell’s, and nobody shared the amount of respect and love he had for the West. He created art now renowned around the world, and his statue stands in the US Capitol Building representing all of Montana. But what made the cowboy’s art so famous was the way he lived.
This piece of art was commission in 1853 and hung in 1855. The painting captures Hernando De Soto, the Spanish conquistador and explorer, riding in on a white horse symbolizing victory, in the finest of attire in the brightness of the picture. The painting depicts his discovery of the Mississippi River as he and troops approach the river and the Natives that are camped in front of it. As De Soto moves towards the Natives, who are in front of their teepees, the chief extends a seemly piece offering a piece pipe to him. This picture further tells a deeper story as you look at the darker part of it. There are cannons, weapons, and injured men. There is someone praying as a cross is being into the ground, indicating there was a battle for
In the short story “Chickamauga,” by Ambrose Bierce, there are several examples of imagery throughout the passages that help to describe the horrors of war. Bierce sets the story with a young boy playing war in a forest, who is then approached by a “formidable enemy,” a rabbit. The sudden appearance startles the boy into fleeing, calling for his mother in “inarticulate cries,” and his skin getting “cruelly torn by brambles.” The selection of these details leaves a lucid image in the mind of the reader, allowing them to see a sobbing boy running through the forest, covered in cuts and scratches. It represents the innocence and fear of a child, lost and alone in an unknown place. The birds above his head “sang merrily” as the boy was “overcome
Pioch, N. (2002, Jul 16). WebMuseum: Pollock, Jackson. Retrieved 3 30, 2014, from Pollock, Jackson: http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/pollock/
At first glance, John Taylor and Howling Wolf’s visual representations of the treaty signing at Medicine Creek Lodge appear very different from one another. It is more than apparent that the two artists have very different interpretations of the same event. This paper will visually analyze both works of art by comparing and contrasting the compositional balance, medium, and use of color, as well as how the artists narrated their views using different visual elements.
Artist, Frederic Remington was a painter and sculptor who had many subjects for his art like native americans, cavalry officers, and horses. His paintings promoted the westward expansion where one could find freedom in exploring the vast open areas of unknown America’s wilderness. His style and images depicted strength, courage, perseverance, and adventure to reflect the current attitude of the Westward movement. George Catlin was another important artist of the West, as a young boy growing up in Pennsylvania was fascinated by native americans by finding arrow head artifacts and listening to tales of his mom being captured by Indians. Later in life, he traveled for 8 years where he met 48 Native American tribes and produced more than 500 paintings of native americans in full regalia. His work was done in watercolors and oils to record the tribes he met. He didn’t believe in the saying, “the only good Indian is a dead Indian”(Harold McCracken, pg. 13). The Hudson River School member, Albert BIerstadt was a painter who used luminism, a type of romanticism to brighten up his paintings yet still have a rugged appeal. He caught the public’s eye and opened up the West as full of opportunities for exploration. His grand scale landscapes of the West were painted using an abundance of detailed lighting to capture
Mooney, Amy M. “Archibald J. Motley Jr.” The David C. Driskell Series of African American Art: Volume IV. Pomegranate - San Francisco. Copyright 2004 6.
John Gast’s painting titled American Progress perfectly portrays the idea of manifest destiny that was engulfing the minds of Americans. In the right side of the painting you see western influence with the boats, a bridge in the distance, and trains with little or no track in front of them allowing the mind to think they are pushing west. In the middle of the landscape are horses, buggies, covered wagons, showing a slight increase in modernity compared to what is to the far left of the painting, the Indians, savages. Gast also places that of western influence in the light and the old primitive way on the dark. This is not coincidence, the idea that primitive behavior is improper and in the dark of what it could be is precisely what Gast wanted to present. You also see in bottom left corner an animal showing its teeth, another signal of the danger that the move west is. What is probably noticed first is the woman in the center of the painting. The angel is the guiding light of manifest destiny, the one who is bringing the light that you see so prominently in the right side of the pa...
Produced in 1943, They Died With Their Boots On, a Warner Brothers® film, is a horribly inaccurate account of the events that lead to the Battle of Little Big Horn. His early days in war were depicted accurately, however. Boots told of his experiences at West Pointe; the most important experience is, notably, his graduation. He received the absolute worst scores ever recorded at West Pointe upon his commencement. After that point, it all goes down hill. Custer was also a womanizer, but in this film he was quite a gentlemen, being sure to get Elizabeth Bacon’s father’s permission for everything the two did together. Custer was displayed as a very sympathetic and warm-hearted general, while he was, in actuality, not such. Custer was known to be rather a large egoist and somewhat of a rude man. Then, for “dramatic effect”, filmmakers fabricated a conspiracy that Custer’s “enemies” concocted to remove him from opposition. His opponents, executives of a large company which he refused a position in, “lied” about gold in the Black Hills in order to trick thousands of Americans into violating a peace treaty with the Sioux. The truth: there really WAS gold in the Black Hills. Negro slaves were depicted as goofy and silly, added only for comic effect. One lady in particular danced about singing a rhyme, “Rabbit’s foot, work your charm, protect that lady’s man from harm!” after reading the “tea leaves” for a friend. The Sioux Indians were also depicted rather inaccurately. They all wore a single feather in the backs of their heads and yipped and hollered just as “Indians” would do. They screamed and beat their hands on their mouths, all the while speaking English in the manner of a five year-old. Finally, the film’s depiction of Civil War battles, not to mention the battle of Little Big Horn, were laughable. There were twenty, MAYBE thirty men all lined up on either side of the field, and every time the Union soldiers fought, at least two Confederate soldiers or Indians fell, dead. However, when the opposing side fired or attacked, the Union cavalries were nearly impregnable.
This painting has a landscape shape, as well as belonging to a historical or war genre. The angle of this painting is a pretty normal eye level, as if standing a couple meters away from the scene and looking straight and a couple degrees tilted downwards. I can tell this because you can see on the painting that Sargent has made the ground visible as well. The painting centers around injured and tired soldiers, about 11 of them standing and leaning on each other in a line. The majority of the soldiers are facing the same direction, looking to the right (from the perspective of the viewer) except for two soldiers who are looking the other way. This line of soldiers is being helped by another man who is dressed in overalls and a hat, who is obviously not apart of their group. Almost all of the soldiers we can see that are standing up have a white cloth covering their eyes. This line of soldiers are walking on what looks to be a series of wooden planks, laid down horizontally. These wooden planks are leading a path towards several ropes that are tied down to the ground around the soldiers. You can see one of the soldiers in the first line has his leg lifted as if walking up stairs, to accent the step of the wooden plank. The ropes are attached onto dark, metal connector that straps the ro...