At the Old Well of Acoma

1904
(American, 1868–1952)
Image: 32.3 x 41.6 cm (12 11/16 x 16 3/8 in.); Matted: 50.8 x 61 cm (20 x 24 in.)
© E. S. Curtis
This artwork is known to be under copyright.
Location: not on view

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Description

Edward S. Curtis, an ambitious commercial photographer in Seattle, recorded the vestiges of what he conceived as a "vanished race." Over time he compiled The North American Indian, a 723-image survey of the customs, habitats, and dress of North American Indians. Curtis saw tribal life through a veil of cultural preconceptions that sometimes led him to introduce false costumes and artifacts into his so-called documentations. The mythic "Indians" that issued from these interventions were further removed from reality by the use of soft-focus lenses and retouching to add highlights or delete attributes that Curtis considered un-Indian. His haunting images of North American life might thus be considered within the framework of pictorialism, rather than of documentation.
At the Old Well of Acoma

At the Old Well of Acoma

1904

Edward S. Curtis

(American, 1868–1952)
America, 20th century

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