Edward S. Curtis Portraits - The Many Faces of the Native American

Edward S Curtis is the best-known photographer of American Indians, but is not primarily thought of as a portrait artist. A talented photographer, historian, artist and ethnographer, when Curtis began to work in earnest on his 20-volume North American Indian in 1898, his goal was to capture the `vanishing Indian' as he saw the race. By 1930, Curtis was broke and broken. He had lost what wealth he had, his marriage, his health and his drive, but he had completed his massive opus, a project for which he ultimately took more than 40,000 photographes. He shot families, daily life, costumes, rituals and individuals. A large number of his photographs of Indians are stunning portraits, showing pride, anger, resignation, mischief and the full range of human emotion. Many of the faces stare quietly at you - images from a world that no longer exists. Curtis was a people person. As he indicated to Grinnell, his manner with the Indians won him the trust and confidence of many, allowing him to show much raw emotion as he set out to record their images for posterity. Many decades later, Curtis' work stands out as both history and art. This collection of his portraits captures his technical skills, artistic ability and sense of history...