Coloured lithography "Encampment of the Piekann Indians" ·  Beyer & Hürlimann · ID: 3043349

Description

Genre picture: figural groups, lots of tipis in vast landscape, printed: “Ch. Bodmer pina. at nat” - “Imp. de Bougeard” - “Beyer & Hürlimann sc.”, picture title (ger./fr./engl.), passepartout in green linen, glazed/framed, m: 47 cm x 35,5 cm/64 cm x 53,5 cm (frame), slightly dam., paper slightly wavy.
By Beyer and Hürlimann after a watercolour/aquatinta by Karl Bodmer, in: M. zu Wied-Neuwied, “Reise in das Innere Nord-America, 1839-41.

The Swiss artist Karl Bodmer (1809-1893) was a painter, illustrator, lithographer, graphic artist and etcher. From 1832 to 1834 he accompanied the explorer Prince Maximilian zu Wied-Neuwied on his expedition to the banks of the Missouri in North America. He brought back to Germany more than 400 detailed sketches and watercolours of Indians, plants, animals and landscapes. From the selected works, renowned engravers in Paris, Zurich and London produced steel and copper plates, which exactly reproduced his watercolours and were published in the well-known work “Reise in das Innere Nord-America” ​​from 1837 onwards. They show the Wild West of the 19th century as it really was. Today, Bodmer’s pictures and the travelogues of Maximilian zu Wied-Neuwied are amongst the most important documents about the lost Indian cultures of the Great Plains on the Missouri River. The possibility that his pictures influenced Karl May is tempting, but not proven.

Comparing literature

Maximilian zu Wied-Neuwied (ed.), "Reise in das Innere Nord-America, Coblenz, Paris, London, 1839-41 (several volumes)