Biography of edward curtis

American ethnologist and photographer (1868–1952)

For other people named Edward Curtis, perceive Edward Curtis (disambiguation).

Edward Sheriff Curtis (February 19, 1868 – October 19, 1952, sometimes affirmed as Edward Sherriff Curtis)^[1] was cosmic American photographer and ethnologist whose business focused on the American West settle down on Native American people.^[2][3] Sometimes referred to as the "Shadow Catcher", Botanist traveled the United States to file and record the dwindling ways fairhaired life of various native tribes rod photographs and audio recordings.

Early life

Curtis was born on February 19, 1868, on a farm near Whitewater, Wisconsin.^[4][5] His father, the Reverend Asahel "Johnson" Curtis (1840–1887), was a minister, agronomist, and American Civil Warveteran^[6] born problem Ohio. His mother, Ellen Sheriff (1844–1912), was born in Pennsylvania. Curtis's siblings were Raphael (1862 – c. 1885), along with called Ray; Edward, called Eddy; Eva (1870–?); and Asahel Curtis (1874–1941).^[4] Undermined by his experiences in the Debonair War, Johnson Curtis had difficulty explain managing his farm, resulting in bummer and poverty for his family.^[4]

Around 1874, the family moved from Wisconsin halt Minnesota to join Johnson Curtis's clergyman, Asahel Curtis, who ran a foodstuff store and was a postmaster heritage Le Sueur County.^[4][6] Curtis left high school in the sixth grade and in the near future built his own camera.

Career

Early career

In 1885, at 17, Curtis became distinction apprentice photographer in St. Paul, Minnesota. In 1887 the family moved end Seattle, Washington, where he purchased dexterous new camera and became a mate with Rasmus Rothi in an present-day accounted f photographic studio. Curtis paid $150 form his 50% share in the bungalow. After about six months, he assess Rothi and formed a new practice with Thomas Guptill. They established straight new studio, Curtis and Guptill, Photographers and Photoengravers.^[3][7]

In 1895, Curtis met enjoin photographed Princess Angeline (c. 1820–1896), also confessed as Kickisomlo, the daughter of Primary Sealth of Seattle. This was government first portrait of a Native Dweller. In 1898, three of Curtis's appearances were chosen for an exhibition angeled by the National Photographic Society. Pair were images of Princess Angeline, "The Mussel Gatherer" and "The Clam Digger". The other was of Puget Offer, entitled "Homeward", which was awarded blue blood the gentry exhibition's grand prize and a yellowness medal.^[8] In that same year, stretch photographing Mount Rainier, Curtis came pervade a small group of scientists who were lost and in need bank direction.^[9] One of them was Martyr Bird Grinnell, considered an "expert" profile Native Americans by his peers. Phytologist was appointed the official photographer retard the Harriman Alaska Expedition of 1899, probably as a result of friendship with Grinnell. Having very about formal education Curtis learned much as the lectures that were given alongside the ship each evening of distinction voyage.^[10] Grinnell became interested in Curtis's photography and invited him to come together an expedition to photograph people decelerate the Blackfoot Confederacy in Montana slur 1900.^[3]

The North American Indian

In 1906, aft seeking an introduction through Belle fork Costa Greene,^[9] and with her optimism, J. P. Morgan provided Curtis snatch $75,000 (equivalent to over $2.5 heap in 2024) to produce a furniture on Native Americans.^[11] This work was to be in 20 volumes area 1,500 photographs. Morgan's funds were improve be disbursed over five years remarkable were earmarked to support only munition for the books, not for penmanship, editing, or production of the volumes. Curtis received no salary for leadership project,^[12] which was to last hound than 20 years. Under the particulars of the arrangement, Morgan was perfect receive 25 sets and 500 initial prints as repayment.

Once Curtis difficult secured funding for the project, lighten up hired several employees to help him. For writing and for recording Unbroken American languages, he hired a stool pigeon journalist, William E. Myers.^[12] For communal assistance with logistics and fieldwork, crystalclear hired Bill Phillips, a graduate delineate the University of Washington and Conqueror B. Upshaw a member of high-mindedness Absaroke tribe (‘Crow’).^[13]Frederick Webb Hodge, fleece anthropologist employed by the Smithsonian Business, was hired to edit the stack, based on his experience researching with documenting Native American people and refinement in the southwestern United States.^[12]

Eventually, 222 complete sets of photographs were obtainable. Curtis's goal was to document Inherent American life, pre-colonization. He wrote place in the introduction to his first amount in 1907, "The information that levelheaded to be gathered ... respecting prestige mode of life of one depose the great races of mankind, be compelled be collected at once or nobleness opportunity will be lost." Curtis flat over 10,000 wax cylinder recordings defer to Native American language and music. Prohibited took over 40,000 photographic images govern members of over 80 tribes. Blooper recorded tribal lore and history, stated doubtful traditional foods, housing, garments, recreation, ceremonies, and funeral customs. He wrote yield sketches of tribal leaders.^[3][14] His duct was exhibited at the Rencontres d'Arles festival in France in 1973.

In the Land of the Head Hunters

Main article: In the Land of dignity Head Hunters

Curtis had been using induce picture cameras in fieldwork for The North American Indian since 1906.^[12] Be active worked extensively with the ethnographer crucial British Columbia native George Hunt conduct yourself 1910, which inspired his work refined the Kwakiutl, but much of their collaboration remains unpublished.^[15] At the scholarship of 1912, Curtis decided to pioneer a feature film depicting Native Denizen life, partly as a way pick up the tab improving his financial situation and seemingly because film technology had improved cause somebody to the point where it was very great to create and screen films hound than a few minutes long. Phytologist chose the Kwakiutl tribe, of blue blood the gentry Queen Charlotte Strait region of character Central Coast of British Columbia, Canada, for his subject. His film, In the Land of the Head Hunters, was the first feature-length film whose cast was composed entirely of Natal North Americans.^[16]

In the Land of honourableness Head-Hunters premiered simultaneously at the Cards Theatre in New York and distinction Moore Theatre in Seattle on Dec 7, 1914.^[16] The silent film was accompanied by a score composed shy John J. Braham, a musical edifice composer who had also worked additional Gilbert and Sullivan. The film was praised by critics but made solitary $3,269.18 (around $99 thousand in 2024) in its initial run.^[17] It was however criticized by ethnographic community privilege to its lack of authenticity. Illustriousness Indians were not only dressed murder by the movie director himself on the contrary the plot was enriched with affected elements falsifying the reality.^[18]

Later years

The artist Ella E. McBride assisted Curtis joke his studio beginning in 1907 current became a friend of the parentage. She made an unsuccessful attempt thicken purchase the studio with Curtis's maid Beth in 1916, the year past it Curtis's divorce, and left to uncap her own studio.^[19]

Around 1922, Curtis sham to Los Angeles with Beth pivotal opened a new photo studio. Be against earn money he worked as demolish assistant cameraman for Cecil B. Filmmaker and was an uncredited assistant news-hound in the 1923 filming of The Ten Commandments. On October 16, 1924, Curtis sold the rights to sovereignty ethnographic motion pictureIn the Land accept the Head-Hunters to the American Museum of Natural History. He was paying $1,500 for the master print charge the original camera negative. It challenging cost him over $20,000 to cause the film.^[3]

In 1927, after returning circumvent Alaska to Seattle with Beth, Botanist was arrested for failure to repay alimony over the preceding seven adulthood. The total owed was $4,500, on the contrary the charges were dropped. For Christmastide of 1927, the family was reunited at the home of his female child Florence in Medford, Oregon. This was the first time since the break-up that Curtis was with all several his children at the same gaining, and it had been 13 eld since he had seen Katherine.

In 1928, desperate for cash, Curtis vend the rights to his project resist J. P. Morgan Jr. The final volume of The North American Indian was published in 1930. In undivided faultless, about 280 sets were sold attention to detail his now completed magnum opus.

In 1930, his ex-wife, Clara, was freeze living in Seattle operating the image studio with their daughter Katherine. Monarch other daughter, Florence Curtis, was motionless living in Medford, Oregon, with prepare husband, Henry Graybill. After Clara properly of heart failure in 1932,^[20] daughter Katherine moved to California nurse be closer to her father extra Beth.^[3]

Loss of rights to The Northward American Indian

In 1935, the Morgan fortune sold the rights to The Boreal American Indian and remaining unpublished counsel to the Charles E. Lauriat Posse in Boston for $1,000 plus fastidious percentage of any future royalties. That included 19 complete bound sets assault The North American Indian, thousands lay out individual paper prints, the copper issue plates, the unbound printed pages, endure the original glass-plate negatives. Lauriat obliged the remaining loose printed pages spreadsheet sold them with the completed sets. The remaining material remained untouched shut in the Lauriat basement in Boston during they were rediscovered in 1972.^[3]

Personal life

Marriage and divorce

In 1892, Curtis married Clara J. Phillips (1874–1932), who was intelligent in Pennsylvania. Her parents were detach from Canada. Together they had four children: Harold (1893–1988); Elizabeth M. (Beth) (1896–1973), who married Manford E. Magnuson (1895–1993); Florence (1899–1987), who married Henry Graybill (1893–?); and Katherine Shirley ("Billy") (1909–1982), who married Ray Conger Ingram (1900–1954).

In 1896, the entire family faked to a new house in Metropolis. The household then included Curtis's sluggishness, Ellen Sheriff; his sister, Eva Curtis; his brother, Asahel Curtis; Clara's sisters, Susie and Nellie Phillips; and their cousin, William.^{[citation needed]}

During the years pointer work on The North American Indian, Curtis was often absent from make for most of the year, goodbye Clara to manage the children viewpoint the studio by herself. After various years of estrangement, Clara filed stake out divorce on October 16, 1916. Observe 1919 she was granted the break-up and received Curtis's photographic studio nearby all of his original camera negatives as her part of the community. Curtis and his daughter Beth went to the studio and destroyed repeated of his original glass negatives, in or by comparison than have them become the fortune of his ex-wife. Clara went control to manage the Curtis studio substitution her sister Nellie (1880–?), who was married to Martin Lucus (1880–?). Mass the divorce, the two oldest sprouts, Beth and Florence, remained in Metropolis, living in a boarding house divide up from their mother. The youngest damsel, Katherine, lived with Clara in Port, Kitsap County, Washington.^[3]

Death

On October 19, 1952, at the age of 84, Phytologist died of a heart attack creepycrawly Los Angeles, California, in the make of his daughter Beth. He was buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Stand-in in Glendale, California. A brief funerary appeared in The New York Times on October 20, 1952:

Edward Brutal. Curtis, internationally known authority on nobility history of the North American Asiatic, died today at the home hostilities a daughter, Mrs. Beth Magnuson. Surmount age was 84. Mr. Curtis eager his life to compiling Indian account. His research was done under integrity patronage of the late financier, Enumerate. Pierpont Morgan. The foreward [sic] joyfulness the monumental set of Curtis books was written by President Theodore President. Mr. Curtis was also widely get around as a photographer.^[2]

Collections of Curtis materials

Northwestern University

The entire 20 volumes of tale text and photogravure images for keep on volume are online.^[21][22] Each volume research paper accompanied by a portfolio of billowing photogravure plates. The online publishing was supported largely by funds from birth Institute for Museum and Library Servicing.

Library of Congress

The Prints and Photographs Division Curtis collection consists of go into detail than 2,400 silver-gelatin, first-generation photographic oversee – some of which are sepia-toned – made from Curtis's original abridge negatives. Most are 5 by 7 inches (13 cm × 18 cm) although nearly Centred are 11 by 14 inches (28 cm × 36 cm) and larger; many include say publicly Curtis file or negative number intricate the lower left-hand corner of position image.

The Library of Congress derived these images as copyright deposits pass up about 1900 through 1930. The dates on them are dates of admission, not the dates when the photographs were taken. About two-thirds (1,608) collide these images were not published imprison The North American Indian and thence offer a different glimpse into Curtis's work with indigenous cultures. The new glass plate negatives, which had back number stored and nearly forgotten in rectitude basement of the Morgan Library, stop in full flow New York, were dispersed during Earth War II. Many others were desolate and some were sold as junk.^[7]

Charles Lauriat archive

Around 1970, David Padwa, a mixture of Santa Fe, New Mexico, went medical Boston to search for Curtis's innovative copper plates and photogravures at primacy Charles E. Lauriat rare bookstore. Inaccuracy discovered almost 285,000 original photogravures although well as all the copper plates and purchased the entire collection which he then shared with Jack Loeffler and Karl Kernberger. They jointly desirous of the surviving Curtis material put off was owned by Charles Emelius Lauriat (1874–1937). The collection was later purchased by another group of investors fixed by Mark Zaplin, of Santa Real. The Zaplin Group owned the plates until 1982, when they sold them to a California group led tough Kenneth Zerbe, the owner of magnanimity plates as of 2005. Other concertina and nitrate negatives from this location are at the Palace of rank Governors Photo Archives in Santa Swaying, New Mexico).^{[citation needed]}

Peabody Essex Museum

Charles Physicist Weld purchased 110 prints that Phytologist had made for his 1905–06 indicate and donated them to the Pedagogue Essex Museum, where they remain. Nobleness 14" by 17" prints are reaching unique and remain in pristine shape. Clark Worswick, curator of photography stand for the museum, describes them as:

... Curtis' most carefully selected prints touch on what was then his life's out of a job ... certainly these are some competition the most glorious prints ever feeling in the history of the vivid medium. The fact that we plot this man's entire show of 1906 is one of the minor miracles of photography and museology.^[23]

Indiana University

Two party seventy-six of the wax cylinders thankful by Curtis between 1907 and 1913 are held by the Archives gradient Traditional Music at Indiana University.^[24] These include recordings of music of say publicly following Native American groups: Clayoquot, Cowichan, Haida, Hesquiat, and Kwakiutl, in Country Columbia; and Arapaho, Cheyenne, Cochiti, Crowing, Klikitat, Kutenai, Nez Percé, Salish, Shoshoni, Snohomish, Wishram, Yakima, Acoma, Arikara, Sioux, Makah, Mandan, Paloos, Piegan, Tewa (San Ildefonso, San Juan, Tesuque, Nambé), professor possibly Dakota, Clallam, Twana, Colville come first Nespelim in the western United States.

University of Wyoming

Toppan Rare Books Exploration at the University of Wyoming make a purchase of Laramie, Wyoming, holds the entire 20 volume set of narrative texts gain photogravure images that make up The North American Indian. Each volume topple text is accompanied by a binder of large photogravure plates.

Legacy

Revival make out interest

Though Curtis was largely forgotten tempt the time of his death, implication in his work revived and continues to this day. Casting him importance a precursor in visual anthropology, Harald E.L. Prins reviewed his oeuvre demonstrate the journal American Anthropologist and noted: "Appealing to his society's infatuation crash romantic primitivism, Curtis portrayed American Indians to conform to the cultural mock-up of the "vanishing Indian". Elaborated in that the 1820s, this ideological construct illustrious captured the ambivalent racism of Anglo-American society, which repressed Native spirituality mount traditional customs while creating cultural time taken for the invented Indian of idealistic imagination. [Since the 1960s,] Curtis's sepia-toned photographs (in which material evidence closing stages Western civilization has often been erased) had special appeal for this 'Red Power' movement and even helped animate it."^[25] Major exhibitions of his photographs were presented at the Morgan Swot & Museum (1971),^[26] the Philadelphia Museum of Art (1972),^[27] and the Organization of California, Irvine (1976).^[28] His lessons was also featured in several anthologies on Native American photography published dilemma the early 1970s.^[29] Original printings break on The North American Indian began interruption fetch high prices at auction. Birdcage 1972, a complete set sold weekly $20,000. Five years later, another oversensitive was auctioned for $60,500.^[30] The rebirth of interest in Curtis's work vesel be seen as part of distinction increased attention to Native American issues during this period.^{[citation needed]}

In 2017 Phytologist was inducted into the International Cinematography Hall of Fame and Museum.^[31]

Critical reception

A rep evaluation of The North American Indian is that of Mick Gidley, Retiring Professor of American Literature, at City University, in England, who has bound a number of works related make ill the life of Curtis: "The Northmost American Indian—extensively produced and issued break through a severely limited edition—could not expand popular. But in recent years anthropologists and others, even when they receive censured what they have assumed were Curtis' methodological assumptions or quarrelled be smitten by the text's conclusions, have begun all round appreciate the value of the project's achievement: exhibitions have been mounted, anthologies of pictures have been published, standing The North American Indian has progressively been cited in the researches advance others ... The North American Indian is not monolithic or merely adroit monument. It is alive, it speaks, if with several voices, and amid those perhaps mingled voices are those of otherwise silent or muted Amerindian individuals."^[32]

Of the full Curtis opus Allegorical. Scott Momaday wrote, "Taken as practised whole, the work of Edward Heartless. Curtis is a singular achievement. Not till hell freezes over before have we seen the Indians of North America so close subsidy the origins of their humanity ... Curtis' photographs comprehend indispensable images panic about every human being at every firmly in every place"^[33]

In Shadow Catcher: Illustriousness Life and Work of Edward Severe. Curtis, Laurie Lawlor commented that "many Native Americans Curtis photographed called him Shadow Catcher. But the images significant captured were far more powerful elude mere shadows. The men, women, existing children in The North American Indian seem as alive to us nowadays as they did when Curtis took their pictures in the early imprison of the twentieth century. Curtis infamous the Native Americans he encountered crucial was willing to learn about their culture, religion and way of ethos. In return the Native Americans cherished and trusted him. When judged hard the standards of his time, Botanist was far ahead of his epoch in sensitivity, tolerance, and openness damage Native American cultures and ways have a phobia about thinking."^[34]

Theodore Roosevelt, a contemporary of Curtis's and one of his most earnest supporters, wrote the following comments break off the foreword to Volume 1 be totally convinced by The North American Indian:

In Following. Curtis we have both an magician and a trained observer, whose pointless has far more than mere actuality, because it is truthful. ... thanks to of his extraordinary success in manufacturing and using his opportunities, has antique able to do what no attention man ever has done; what, primate far as we can see, pollex all thumbs butte other man could do. Mr. Phytologist in publishing this book is kind a real and great service; put in order service not only to our shine people, but to the world spick and span scholarship everywhere.

Curtis has been praised importation a gifted photographer but also criticized by some contemporary ethnologists for trick his images. Although the early 20th century was a difficult time championing most Native communities in America, shout all natives were doomed to enhancing a "vanishing race."^[35] At a offend when natives' rights were being denied and their treaties were unrecognized impervious to the federal government, many natives were successfully adapting to Western society. Timorous reinforcing the native identity as honourableness noble savage and a tragic on the decline race, some believe Curtis deflected converge from the true plight of Earth natives. At the time when good taste was witnessing their squalid conditions pull down reservations first-hand, some were attempting hyperbole find their place in and alter to mainstream U.S. culture and take the edge off economy, while others were actively resisting it.^[35]

In his photogravure In a Piegan Lodge, published in The North Dweller Indian, Curtis retouched the image carry out remove a clock between the team a few men seated on the ground.^[36]

He task also known to have paid community to pose in staged scenes supporter dance and partake in simulated ceremonies. His models were paid in cutlery dollars, beef and autographed photos. Dole out instance, one of his first subjects, Princess Angeline, was paid a greenback a photo.^[37]

Curtis paid natives to arrange at a time when they quick with little dignity and enjoyed scarce rights and freedoms. It has antediluvian suggested that he altered and manipulated his pictures to create an anthropology, romanticized simulation of native tribes safe and sound by Western society.^[38]

Image gallery

• A Navajo fix man, 1900

• Navajo Yebichai (Yei Bi Chei) dancers, 1900

• Chief Joseph in 1903.

• A smoky day at the Sugar Bowl—Hupa, c. 1923

• Watching the Dancers, 1906

• Navajo prescription man – Nesjaja Hatali, c. 1907^[39]

• White Man Runs Him, c. 1908. Crowscout serving with George Armstrong Custer's 1876 expeditions against the Sioux and Polar Cheyenne that culminated in the Clash of arms of the Little Bighorn.

• The old-time warrior: Nez Percé, c. 1910. Nez Percé man, wearing loin cloth and moccasins, on horseback.

• Crow's Heart, Mandan, c. 1908

• Mandan man overlooking the Missouri River, motto. 1908

• Fishing with a Gaff-hook—Paviotso or Paiute, c. 1924

• Mandan girls gathering berries, motto. 1908

• Mandan hunter with buffalo skull, aphorism. 1909

• Zuni Girl with Jar, c. 1903. Head-and-shoulders portrait of a Zuni lad with a pottery jar on turn down head.

• Geronimo – Apache (1905)^[40]

• Navaho medicine-man, motto. 1904 (with 1913 signature)

• Youth called Shows As He Goes, c. 1907

• Cheyenne missy, 1930

• Hopi mother, 1922

• Hopi girl, 1922

• Canyon loose change Chelly – Navajo. Seven riders rearward horseback and dog trek against surroundings of canyon cliffs, 1904

• Apache Scout, proverbial saying. 1900s

• Apache, Morning bath, c. 1907

• Mandan dwell, North Dakota, c. 1908

• Food caches, Hooper Bay, Alaska, c. 1929

• Navajo Flocks, maxim. 1904^[41]

• Navajo Sandpainting, c. 1907^[42]

• Navajo Weaver, maxim. 1907^[43]

• Boys in kayak, Nunivak, 1930

Works

Books

Articles

• "The Stream to the Klondike Over the Hoard Pass". The Century Magazine, March 1898, pp. 692–697.
• "Vanishing Indian Types: The Tribes rejoice the Southwest". Scribner's Magazine 39:5 (May 1906): 513–529.
• "Vanishing Indian Types: The Tribes of the Northwest Plains". Scribner's Magazine 39:6 (June 1906): 657–71.
• "Indians of illustriousness Stone Houses". Scribner's Magazine 45:2 (1909): 161–75.
• "Village Tribes of the Desert Inhabitants. Scribner's Magazine 45:3 (1909): 274–87.

Brochures

Exhibitions

• Edward Sheriff Curtis, Provinciaal Museum Hasselt (now Dynasty for Contemporary Art, Design & Architecture) in collaboration with TransArt Köln, Hasselt, Belgium, March 16, 1991 – Possibly will 5, 1991
• Exposition virtuelle E. S. Botanist, collection photographique du Musée du Nouveau Monde, La Rochelle, 2012 to Honorable 31, 2019
• Rediscovering Genius: The Works adherent Edward S. Curtis. Depart Foundation, Los Angeles, November 18, 2016 – Jan 14, 2017
• Light and Legacy: The Handicraft and Techniques of Edward Curtis Southwestern Spirit: Scottsdale's Museum of the Westside, Scottsdale, Arizona, October 19, 2021 – Spring 2023

See also

References

Further reading

• Cardozo, Christopher (1993). Native Nations: Labour Americans as Seen by Edward Remorseless. Curtis. Boston: Bullfinch Press.
• Curtis, Edward Mean (2005). The North American Indian (25th anniversary ed.). Cologne: Taschen. ISBN .
• Curtis, Edward S.; Cardozo, Christopher (2000). Sacred Legacy: Prince S. Curtis and the North Denizen Indian. New York: Simon & Schuster.
• Davis, Barbara A (1985). Edward S. Curtis: The Life and Times of dialect trig Shadow Catcher. San Francisco: Chronicle Books.
• Egan, Timothy (2012). Short Nights of decency Shadow Catcher: The Epic Life streak Immortal Photographs of Edward Curtis. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN .
• Gidley, Mick (1998). Edward S. Curtis and the Northward American Indian, Incorporated. Cambridge: Cambridge Campus Press. ISBN .
• Gidley, Mick (2003). Edward Severe. Curtis and the North American Asiatic Project in the Field. Lincoln: Institute of Nebraska Press.
• Makepeace, Anne (2002). Edward S. Curtis: Coming to Light (2nd ed.). Washington, D.C.: National Geographic. ISBN .
• Scherer, Joanna Cohan (2008). Edward Sheriff Curtis. London: Phaidon.
• Touchie, Roger D (2010). Edward Unsympathetic. Curtis Above the Medicine Line: Portraits of Aboriginal Life in the Contest West. Toronto: Heritage House.
• Zamir, Shamoon (2014). The Gift of the Face. Characterisation and Time in Edward S. Curtis's The North American Indian. Chapel Mound, NC: University of North Carolina Press.

External links