Bodmer_Publication

Wolfe. In the foreground of this historic painting one sees an Indian warrior kneeling
in front of the dying general. His body is covered in tattoos and he is shown
naked from the waist upwards and with bare feet, that is, not wearing moccasins.
The other three portraits are prints from Karl Bodmer’s original watercolors.
Bodmer is mentioned on the prints as the artist. Plate 46 shows in oblong format
two portraits next to each other. On the left is the Dakota warrior Wah-Menitu,
l aterally reversed in relation to the original watercolor that Bodmer painted at
Fort Pierre in June 1833. In the Prince’s travel journal this picture is only included
as a woodcut. 18
The portrait on the right is titled “Ein Muskole” (a Muskole man) but in the text
he is referred to as “Ein Muskoke-Indianer” (a Muskoke Indian). 19 On Bodmer’s
original watercolor, which he painted in March 1833 near St. Louis, the name
Wakusasse is given and the man is described as belonging to the “Muskoke”
tribe (i.e. Meskwaki or Fox). 20 In Prince Maximilian’s travel journal Wakusasse is
described on Plate 3 (right) as a “Musquake Indian.”
On this print, again laterally reversed, Wakusasse’s necklace is decorated with
a bone whistle; this instrument is not shown in the original watercolor and was
probably added later, taking other pictures by Bodmer as example. Schinz includes
a lengthy description of Wakusasse, the details of which could only have been
provided by either Prince Maximilian or Karl Bodmer. 21
Plate 47 of Schinz’s book is a full-page portrait (but again laterally reversed) of
“Makuie-Poka, Sohn des Wolfen” (Makuie-Poka, Son of the Wolf), a Piegan Blackfoot
chief whom Bodmer painted in August 1833 at Fort McKenzie in what is
now the State of Montana. 22 Schinz offers a detailed description of Makuie-Poka
(Child of the Wolf), again based on information provided by either Wied or B odmer:
“The savage is in full array. He is wrapped in a green, red or yellow [striped] horse
blanket; his necklace is made of the claws of the grizzly bear; on his chest he wears
a pouch that contains a mirror such as these vain people always carry on them.
His long hair falls from his head on all sides, decorated with tassels made of
glass-beads and bands decorated with the colored quills of the porcupine.” 23
One should add here that the “horse blanket” was a standard commercial Hudson’s
Bay Company blanket, a common trade good among the Blackfeet in the early
nineteenth century.
We may assume that Schinz was well aware of the fact that the print of Bodmer’s
watercolor was the first published, authentic portrait of an Indian from the
distant, western interior of North America. Next to Bodmer’s name he also added
the date 1834, the year Bodmer and the Prince returned to Europe from their
journeys on the North American continent. His text also reflects a distinct sense
of pride in his Zurich compatriot, for example when he writes “… from an original
painting by Mister Bodmer from Zurich, the Prince of Wied’s travel companion
and illustrator.” 24
I should like to emphasize once more that these three portraits were the first
published copies of pictures of American Indians from Bodmer’s travels in North
America. They were issued about a year after his return to Europe and approximately
four years before Prince Maximilian started publishing his extravagant
travel journal in 1839. This is one of the reasons why the prints are of special
significance: they founded the artist’s reputation as the “Indian Bodmer.”
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