George Catlin

born Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania, 1796; died Jersey City, New Jersey, 1872

BiographyGeorge Catlin was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, and studied law and practiced from 1820 to 1823. He was first inspired to paint the Native American people of the West after seeing a delegation of Plains Indians pass though Philadelphia, where he was living in 1826. After his encounter with the Plains delegation, he began traveling up the Missouri River in 1832, painting as he went. His travels influenced him to be one of the first voices for conservation in the West, advocating for a type of national park or preserve in the Great Plains. By 1840 Catlin boasted of having visited 48 tribes and painted 301 portraits. He published many of them in his book Letters and Notes on the Manners, and Customs, and Conditions of the North American Indians in 1841. He also used the collection of portraits and artifacts that he had amassed to create “Catlin’s Indian Gallery.” He took this show to Europe in the 1840s, performing in London, Brussels, and Paris. Sadly, he had to sell the entire collection owing to financial difficulties that began in the early 1850s. Starting in 1853, Catlin spent much of his later life traveling and painting in the Western Hemisphere, from South America to Siberian Alaska. He died in his sister’s home in Jersey City, New Jersey, in 1872.

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