Carlos Krebs George Catlin and SouthAmerica

George Catlin and South America: A Look at His "Lost" Years and His Paintings of
Northeastern Argentina
Author(s): Edgardo Carlos Krebs
Reviewed work(s):
Source: American Art Journal, Vol. 22, No. 4 (Winter, 1990), pp. 4-39
Published by: Kennedy Galleries, Inc.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1594569 .
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GEORGE CATLINAND SOUTHAMERICA:

A Look at His "Lost"Yearsand His Paintings
of NortheasternArgentina
Edgardo Carlos Krebs
EORGECATLIN(1796-1872)
set himself a pur-
pose in life: to become the historian of the

North American Indian. By that he meant going
West and painting "Man,in the simplicity and loftiness of his nature," and recording "carefully and
correctly" the "characterand customs" of Indian
peoples.' He thoughtIndianswould disappearsoon,
absorbedor forced into extinctionby the advanceof
the frontier.In the 1830s Catlinmade a series of trips
through Indian territory, in the North American
West, the outcome of which were the over four hundredportraitsandlandscapesof the "IndianGallery"
and Letters and Notes on the Manners, Customs,
and Condition of the North American Indians
(London, 1841), a two-volume work thatis a classic
of Americanethnography.Such industrymight suggest that Catlin had a successful career, but the
opposite is true. He failed throughouthis lifetime to
sell the Gallery to Congress; moreover, he was
accused of lying, of inventinghis ethnographicdata.
In the 1840s he sought success abroad, traveling
with his Gallery in Great Britain and France. But
this venture ended in disaster: his wife died, and
then his son; finally he ran into debt and had to be
saved from creditorsby a fellow American,Joseph
Harrison,who paid off the debt, and kept the Indian
Gallery as guarantee.The Gallery was shipped to
Philadelphia,and Catlinnever saw it again.2All this
has been told and retold by Catlin scholars.3
This article deals mainly with some problems
raised by a later period of Catlin's life, specifically
EDGARDO
CARLOSKREBS,borninBuenosAires,Argentina,
received his master's degree in social anthropologyfrom

OxfordUniversityfor which he wrote the thesis, "George
CatlinandtheArgentineIndians."He is now completinghis
doctorateat Oxford,writinga dissertationon the historyof
anthropologicalideas in the River Plate duringthe eighteenth and nineteenthcenturies.Since 1988 he has visited
Washington,D.C., on severaloccasionsto carryoutindependent researchat the SmithsonianInstitution.Mr. Krebsis
also editinghis firstdocumentaryfilm, "Spencer'sLastJourney," based on journals kept in Tierradel Fuego by the
anthropologistSir Baldwin Spencer,who died there while
doing field work,in 1929.
with what he did or did not do in the 1850s, afterhe

had lost the IndianGallery.
Between 1854 and 1860 Catlin almost "disappeared."He maintainedthat during those years he
made two tripsto SouthAmerica, to regions ranging
as widely as the Orinoco and Amazon basins, in
northernSouthAmerica, and the Straitof Magellan,
at the southernmosttip of the continent.When Catlin "reappeared"in Brussels, in the 1860s, he was
working on a new set of paintings-the Cartoon
Collection (Figs. 1, 6-13, 16, 17, 22-24)-and on
three books, all of them based on the South American experiences.4
There is something worrying about this
"period."No documentationhas been found to confirm that Catlin went to South America at all. What
he has to say aboutthese tripsis often confusing and
contradictory.And from an ethnographicpoint of
view, the collection of paintingsand books on South
America cannot compare, in quality or scope, with
the earlierworks on NorthAmerica (Fig. 2). In fact,
a first impression could even lead one to ponder
whether Catlin might have fabricatedall his South
American material-the travels, the paintings, the
books.
In 1854, when the South American "period"
begins, Catlin was bankruptand in no position to
plan an extensive and costly series of trips abroad.
One can assume that he was not in the best possible
spirits either, having just lost not only the Indian
Gallery,but also his wife and son. It is reasonableto
think that he must have been very confused at the
time, and at a loss of what to do next. Catlin himself gives sufficient indications in Last Rambles
Amongstthe Indiansof the RockyMountainsand the
Andes (1867) that his first alleged trip to South
America was linked not with an ongoing project of
painting Indians but to the idea of finding gold in
Brazil and starting a mining company there-a
project,by the way, which was not altogethermad.5
In the attemptto analyze those "lost" years in
Catlin's career,many problems and questionsbegin
to emerge. The most obvious is posed by the sheer
TheAmericanArt Journal/VolumeXXII* Number4

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ANDFOURCHILDREN.Between 1854 and 1869. Oil onpaperboard,18 x 23 7/8".

CHIEF,HISTWOWIVES,
Fig. 1. GeorgeCatlin.LENGUA
Paul MellonCollection,NationalGalleryofArt, Washington,
D.C.

Fig. 2. George Catlin. Two CROWS.1832. Oil on canvas, 29 x 24". Collection, National Museum ofAmerican Art, Smithsonian
Institution, Washington,D.C., Gift of Mrs. Joseph Harrison, Jr.

size of the geographicalarea involved (Fig. 3). This

article will be confined to examining the information Catlin gives on his travels in the northeastern
area of Argentina,just one of the countriesadduced
by the South American itineraries.Even within this
reducedframe of reference,the rangeof the itineraries is somewhat breathtaking:we are told by Catlin
thatafterreturningfrom the northeast,his Argentine
travels continuedfrom there first in the Pampas, on
horseback,and thenby ship to Patagonia.The whole
makesfor a very arduousandcrowdedschedule, and
one that only gets more demandingif Catlin's other
routes in South America between 1854 and 1860 are
recalled. Let us remind ourselves that in that short
period he purportedto have traveledthroughno less
than the Orinoco and Amazon basins, and to have
crossed the Andes andeven wanderedin the Yucatan
Peninsula.Although one might not get that impression from reading Catlin's biographers,6the areas
joined by those itinerariesare huge and far distant
from one other. Moreover, from an ethnographical
and an ethnohistoricalpoint of view, they are also
very dissimilar. These itineraries and no less than
thirty-fourdifferent South American Indian groups
are listed in the catalogue of the CartoonCollection7
-groups whose cultures were variously attunedto
rain forest, plains, coastal and high-altitudeplateau
habitats. This is the complex background against
which Catlin'sextensive travelshave to be matched.
The difficulties of interpretinghis observations
only begin with the mere geographical scope: the
hardthing to do is to place the testimonyCatlingave
of SouthAmericanIndians-visual and literary-in
some sort of focused, pertinent context. For
instance, do the images he provided of a particular
tribe coincide with what we know about it from
other sources? Is his informationabout places and
about Indian customs broadly correct or fictional?
How do Catlin's SouthAmericanpaintingsstand,as
a record of Indian life, within the iconographictraditions of Venezuela,Brazil, Peru, andArgentina?
And what if this kind of approachdid reveal that
Catlinmight have inventeda partof his Indianpaintings and "on the spot" reporting?Such a possibility
moves the inquiryinto a completely differentrealm.
It would be important,for instance, to considerCatlin's purposes, how other artists were representing
Indiansin that period, and whetheran enterpriseas
ambitiousas his was possible in the 1850s.
It is hoped that by focusing on a narrower
area-northeastern Argentina-the issues raised by
these broad questions related to Catlin's South
American itineraries will become clearer and can
then be more adequatelyinvestigated.
A search in the Archivo Nacional of Buenos

Aires for Catlin'sname in the registerof passengers
kept by the port authorityof that city was not successful.8This being the case, anotherway of broadly
testing the authenticityof his presence in Argentina
is by seeing how well his reports match other
sources, without duplicatingthem.
The approximatedate Catlin gives for his jourto
ney the Rio de la Plata is the fall of 1855.9This is
confirmed by a letter from the German scientist
Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), dated September 12, 1855, addressedto Catlin and accompanied by another introductoryletter for the French
botanistAim6 Bonpland (1773-1858) who was then
living in Argentina.'oHumboldt had met Catlin in
Paris and had shown interest in his ethnographic
work. Before leaving for Argentina, Catlin visited
Humboldtin Berlin to discuss his plans. Bonpland
had been Humboldt'scompanion during his travels
of explorationin SouthAmerica, half a centuryearlier. In 1816 Bonplandwas luredby the firstgovernment of the ArgentineConfederationto travelto that
country and settle there. Bonpland was asked to
organize the botanicalgardensin Buenos Aires, but
the plan fell throughsometime afterhe arrivedthere
in 1817 and he had to cope with this turnof events.
He remainedin the countryuntil his death, in 1858,
leading a remarkablebut almost unknownlife. Bonpland and Humboldt stayed in contact during all
those years throughcorrespondence."
In the 1871 catalogue for an exhibition of his
CartoonCollection in New York,Catlin presents an
itinerarythat takes him from Le Havre directly to
Rio de Janeiroand then to Buenos Aires. Characteristically, in Last Rambles, he had given a different
account, by placing his arrivalin Rio "aftera long
and interestingvoyage-or series of voyages" in the
Caribbean.His account of the stay in Rio is equally
vague. He describes the city as "beautiful"with an
"amusing"plaza and inhabitantswho are "gay and
rich."12
When he wrote in Last Rambles about his
arrivalin Buenos Aires, on a date not specified and
on a ship whose name is not given, Catlin failed to
comment on an event that seldom passed unnoticed
by othervisitors:the way passengerswere landed.In
contrast,the descriptionsof this event by the South
American-bornFrench painter Jean L6on Pallibre
(1823-1887)-and of the things he saw from the
ship while approachingthe city-fill the readerwith
confidence,giving him a sense of place. Pallibre,for
instance,states how many shippinglines crossed the
Atlantic from Europe to Buenos Aires, and in what
time they got there. The city, he tantalizingly

describes as lying on a plain, slightly above the water level, its low profile here and thereraised by the
towers of churches;the houses, he notes, were predominantlywhite, with roofs "paintedpink and yellow." The port was so shallow, he explained, that
when winds blew from the south, incoming ships
had to anchora long way off the coast, and "a kind
of wagon mannedby a gaucho on horseback"drove
into the water, "its wheels submergedto the axis,"
and pulled in to the side of the ship. The passengers
were then transferredto the wagon and carriedto the
Fig. 3 (opposite).DrawnbyA. H. Dufour,underthedirection

of Alcide d'Orbigny. CARTEGINtRALE DE L'AMIRIQUEDU
1836. Engraving from
SUD ET DES ILES QUI EN
DIPENDENT.
Alcided'Orbigny,
Mridionale,9
VoyagedansL'Am6rique
vols. (Paris, 1835-1847). Collection,GeneralResearchDivision,TheNew YorkPublicLibrary,Astor;Lenoxand Tilden

Foundations.
wharf (Fig. 4).13
Soon after his arrival in Buenos Aires, Catlin

in
touch with someone he describes as "my
got
friendThomas,"in whose house he was "madewelcome."'14Taking the last months of 1855 as a time
reference (and assuming that Catlin would address
this man by his first name), "Thomas"could have
been Lieutenant Thomas Jefferson Page (18081899), who was then in Buenos Aires as commander
of a mission assigned to him by the Secretaryof the
United States Navy. The mission consisted of
exploring the tributariesof the Rio de la Plata, and
had begun in 1853, soon after the defeat of Juan
Manuel de Rosas (who had been the strongmanof
the ArgentineConfederationfor over twenty years)
made it possible for vessels of foreign countries to
navigatethe watersof the Parandand Uruguay.Free
navigation of these rivers had been forbidden by
Rosas, a decision which eventually led to a skirmish
between a Franco-Britishfleet and the Argentinesat
the Vuelta de Obligado.This obstacle removed with
Rosas's downfall, the Americanswere quick to send
an exploratoryparty under LieutenantPage. Informationon the landscapeandresourcesup the Paranad
and Uruguayrivershad, nevertheless,been industriously collected during Rosas's regime by a number
of travelers, among whom were some British and
Americanconsuls. ~5
On board the WaterWitch,a small side-wheel
steamer,LieutenantPage and his party managed to
reconnoiterpartof the Paranai,until an incidentwith
the Paraguayan government blocked further
progress to the north. The river Uruguay was also
explored up to Salto Grande,where navigationon a
big vessel was made impracticalby rapids. One of
the successes of Page's expeditionwas the discovery
of the sources of the Rio Salado in the Chaco region.
It is known that Page took along a daguerreotype
camera which he seems to have especially cared
for.'6 Interestingly, the American botanist Edward
Palmer,who later became a collector for the Bureau
of American Ethnology of the SmithsonianInstitution, was one of the men under Page's command.17
All this exploring activity on land and on water, in

an ethnographicallyrich area he intended to visit
himself, would, of course, have providedCatlinwith
precisely the informationhe needed. "Thomas"also
recommended to Catlin "a faithful servant manJose Alzar" whose name was "pronouncedAlthar"
Catlin pointed out, "-whom he had employed for
several years, and whose native place was
Corrientes..... His knowledge of the country,andof
several of the Indiantribes, and of their languages"
wrote Catlin, "wasjust the thing for me.""
Unfortunately,all attemptsto prove the hypothesis that "Thomas"was Lieutenant Page, have, so
far, been unsuccessful. Catlin's name does not
appearin Page's book on Argentina,La Plata: The
Argentine Confederationand Paraguay (1859) nor
in the surviving letters and papershe sent, while on
his mission, to the Secretaryof the Navy. The name
of Alzar is not to be found in those documents
either.19
Page left Buenos Aires for the United States on

December 15, 1855. Catlin would, therefore, have
failed to meet Page if he had arrivedonly a little later
than when he supposedly did. Also, and as a final
comment in favor of the meeting taking place, it
could be noted that on returningfrom his tripon the
Parani and Uruguay rivers, Catlin found himself a
room in a hotel. This would be consistent with the
Krebs/Catlin

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Fig. 4. Jean Lion Pallikre. DESEMBARQUE
collection.

fact that "Thomas"-if he were Page-would have

alreadyleft Buenos Aires.
Accordingto his narrative,Catlinseems to have
spent very little time in Buenos Aires duringhis first
stay there. He and Alzar boarded a steamer and
headed up the Paranaitoward Corrientes (Fig. 5)
very soon after his arrival.From newspapersof the
time, it is possible to see that in the 1850s considerable commercial traffic linked Buenos Aires with
Asunci6n, the capital of Paraguayand, at one time,
the centerof the so-called Jesuitempire.The bulk of
this traffic, of course, was operatedby ships which
traveled back and forth using the waterway of the
Parandi.As noted by George J. R. Gordon, part of
this commerce was conducted througha system of
barter.20The pages of El Comercio, a newspaper
publishedin the city of Corrientes,give a very lively
impressionof affairs in the area, aroundthe time of
Catlin's visit, when the province had 85,447 inhabitants.21Full reports were printedof events abroad,
quoting from European and British newspapers
which reachedthe Paranavia sailing packets.In this
way the local people could follow the news of the
CrimeanWar,learningaboutthe Russian armyleaving its position at Kalugereniand of how the Times
criticizedBritain'spoorly conductedsiege of Sebastopol.22The arrival and departureof the post were
closely monitoredby the newspaper,as the numerous printednotices to that effect show. Contactwith
the world beyond occurred,too, throughthe importation of many goods. An advertisementfrom the
marketof the town of Goya includes a list of prices
for cooking oil from Franceand Italy, tobacco from
Paraguay,rice from Brazil, fireworks from India,
flour from the United States, dried fruit and wine
from Spain, and beer from England.23
Catlin records nothing of the voyage up river,
until the steamer reached Corrientes,over six hundredmiles from Buenos Aires. In Corrientes,he recollects landing and taking his luggage to a hotel and
spending most of his time to the north and south of
the city, in Indian "wigwams" to which he was a
"constantvisitor."24No description is given of the
"wigwams," or of the materials from which they
were made. He mentions meeting Payagua (Fig. 6),
and, more interestingly-as we will see-Botocudo
Indians (see Figs. 12 and 13). The latter"hadmade
long voyages in their canoes, and were soon to
return to their native countries," which he rightly
places in Brazil,25althoughthey lived in the environs
of San Salvadordo Bahia, a great distance from the
Corrientesareahe is describing.Catlinis accuratein
placing the Payagua on one bank of the Paraguay
River and the Chaco on the other (see Figs. 22 and
23). An interestingpiece of news involving Indians

and their mobility around the Corrientesarea was
publishedin El Comercioon November 29, 1855. It
involved the Zenta, a vessel which called into the
port of Corrienteson the way back from exploring
the Bermejo River. The Zenta's pilot was a member
of LieutenantPage's team.The vessel had carriedon
board some Indians, who, El Comercio reported,
were now returningto their camps. This small episode suggests thatthe Indianpresence aroundCorrientes was indeed common, as Catlin's testimony
indicates.A census of 1857 states, though, that only
seven Indians were permanently domiciled in the
city.26 This information is consistent with Catlin's
reportof transient"wigwams"to the northand south
of the city.
From Corrientes, Catlin and Alzar headed
northeastup the Paranaibut on a differentvessel. The
tradingsteamermost likely continued to Asunci6n,
taking the course of the Paraguay River. Catlin
describes the new situationas follows:
A sortof barge,not unlikethe keel-boatsof the Missouri,propelledbyeightoars,andfreighted,notunlike
the crafts of that river, with stuffs and hardware,
&c ... wasstartingfortheupperwatersof theParana;
andAlzaragreeingto handleanoar,andmyselfto lend
a handin rapidwater,got us anagreeableandamusing
passageto the mouthof the IguazuRiver... from
whichpointwe designedto crossthecountryto theupper watersof the Uruguay,and descendthatriverto
BuenosAyres...27
Still on their way fartherup the river, Catlin, out of
the "totalnothingness"for him to do, shoots at waterfowl with his revolver, a contraptionhis companions had never seen before. The sun was
"insupportablyhot"; rapids "became frequent, and
laborious, and tedious, and were said to be more so
ahead of us."28At Candelaria,Catlin and his guide
finally steppedoff the barge and crossed overlandto
the town of Concepci6n, close to the banks of the
UruguayRiver.
When reviewing Catlin's description of this
second leg of the itinerary,one cannot but confirm
its verisimilitude.Barges of eight oars, such as the
one describedby Catlin, were frequentlyadvertised
for sale in the region's newspapers;an old royal road
that linked Candelariato Concepci6n was the shortest and surest way of crossing the land between the
Parand and the Uruguay.29 Finally, the sun should
have been hot, since the journey was probablytaking place aroundlate Januaryor early February,during the summer season, when the waters of the
ParanBdo thin down, andrapids-in the precise area
they were navigating-become numerous, as he

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lon Collection,NationalGalleryofArt.
described.The revolver incident is also interesting:

able in the use of knives, gauchos, in general, shied
away from firearms,closing their eyes when shooting, and aiming miserably."?
Catlin also mentions, in passing, "cliffs of red
sandstone." "Red earth"is, in fact, a geological
characteristicof those parts of northernCorrientes
and the province of Misiones, which were on Catlin's way to Candelaria.
For the returntrip down the Uruguay River to
Buenos Aires, Alzar obtainedin Concepci6n a dugout canoe andthe help of an "old acquaintance"who
would journey with them (Fig. 7). The tripitself was
recountedby Catlin in his usual haphazardway. He

uses severalpages to explain his recipe for preparing
"Mosquito Soup"; mentions that the party slept on
islands; slips off into a long digression about the
Amazonian Indians' body paint (which he calls
"theorems")and about the humanpassion for ornamentation,finally to returnto the Toba and Lengua
(Figs. 8, 9, 10, and 11), "whom we left on the Uruguay.""About them, in fact, he says nothing.
It is a disappointingend for the chapter,which,
in general,seems to have been writtenin haste, without Catlin having thought out his plan very well. Its
promise as a source for insightful information on
14
Krebs/Catlin

OFTHEURUGUAY-MAKING
A SKETCH.
Between 1854 and 1869. Oil on paperboard,18 5/8x
Fig. 7. George Catlin. SHORE
24 7/8".PaulMellonCollection,
NationalGalleryofArt.
Indiancustoms is not realized. Its overall credibility

hinges on a loose frameworkof facts. For instance,
the names of the towns of La Cruz and San Pedro,
and of the Rio Negro, which he would have encountered as he moved south, are referredto correctly.
Mosquitoes, beyond the joke Catlin makes of them,
had been the tortureof travelersin this often marshy
area since the days of the famed explorer Alvar
Nifiez Cabezade Vaca (1490?-1557?). On the other
hand, Catlin fails to give any particulars of his
encounterwith Bonpland,an encounterwhich--one
could safely assume-would have been one of the
high points of that trip. Catlin's omission deserves
some elaborationand will be discussed later.

From an ethnographicpoint of view, Catlin's
account of his journey on the Parani and Uruguay
rivers mixes correct observations with errors.This
leads to a number of questions, both about the
"facts"Catlin was seeking to convey and about the
stylistic traditionsand techniqueshe used to convey
them. On the "factual"side, it is interestingthat he
mentions Botocudo coming for trade to Corrientes
from their home in Brazil. This informationmakes
sense in the context of what we now know of the
highly complex series of migratorymovements of
the native groups of southernBrazil, Paraguay,and

15
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VILLAGE.
Between1854 and 1869. Oil on paperboard,18 1/4 x 24 5/8".Paul Mellon
Fig. 8. George Catlin. A SMALL
Collection,NationalGalleryofArt.
northeasternArgentina.An importantmotive behind

these recurrentwaves of migrationwas the religious
belief, among the Tupf-Guarani,that there was a
"land without evil," for which they continually
searched, and indeed still do.32 More to the point,
Catlin's informationmakes sense within a narrower
historicalcontext: accordingto Miguel AlbertoBartolome, the area of Misiones (just north of Corrientes) was the domain,duringmost of the nineteenth
century,of a Brazil-basedgroup of the Ge-speaking
family called Kaingang.33This scenario makes it
possible to assume that Indians from Brazil would

normallyhave used the waterwaysof the Parani and
Uruguayto go on tradingtripsto Corrientes,as suggested by Catlin's account. But it is clear that there
is a problem with the name he gives to the "tribe."
As mentionedearlier,the Botocudo had their home
in a territoryspanningfrom San Salvadordo Bahia,
in the north,to Rio de Janeiro,in the south, at least
1000 miles from Corrientes.
Furthermore,in the two representationsCatlin
made of these Indians(Figs. 12 and 13), the figures
Krebs/Catlin
16

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Fig. 9. GeorgeCatlin.THREE
are so dissimilarin appearance,dress,body ornamentation,andweaponrythata singleculturalaffiliation looks unlikely.The lip-disksCatlinplaces

in the lowerlips of bothmaleand
indiscriminately
female "Botocudo"is also problematic.Although
there is no consistentpracticeregardinglip-disks
throughoutall the Ge-speakinggroups,F61ixde
Azara(a Spanishcivil servantwho traveledthrough
ParaguayandCorrientesin the lateeighteenthcentury) probablycame close to the truthwhen he
stated,in an essay on the Lengua,that"amongall
the
these Indiannations,the lip-diskcharacterizes
malesex."34
WhatCatlinreportedon this customis
thathe discussedit with a "chief"who told him it
was mainly"confinedto thewomen.""Thepointis
notunimportant.
Theartificial"sexual-dimorphism"
introducedby the use of a lip-diskwas (andstill is)
directlyrelated,amongGe-speakinggroups,to the
socialstandingof menandwomen,andto the symbolicexpressionof valueswhicharecentralto their
cultures,thatis: who can "explain"the world,who
is a "full"person,whocanholdauthorityandpower.

17
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MEDICINE
Fig. 10. George Catlin. LENGUA
24 1/4':Paul MellonCollection,NationalGalleryofArt.
As Anthony Seeger points out, "the ornamentation

of ears and mouth may well indicate the symbolic
importanceof 'hearing'and 'speaking'as those faculties are defined by a given society."36The Ge
groups are not uniform in their use of these ornaments, and to be able to distinguishbetween them in
a painting, the painting must be accurate in the
details.37
What Catlin's haphazardreportingindicates is,
in this case at least, a very limited understandingof
the importanceof these details. Of course, there is
the possibility that he was not reportingthings he

saw but feeding on some kind of pictorial tradition
on the "Botocudo."In London in 1822 "A Botocudo
Chieftain and his Family," had been exhibited, in
person, and advertisedthatway.38Catlin might have
been acquaintedwith the trailof Botocudo representationsthis exhibitionleft behind. Thekla Hartmann
has analyzed the iconographyof these Indians produced by several nineteenth-centurytravelers and
painters (Catlin is not included, but this is not surprising: his South American "period"has remained
18
Krebs/Catlin

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VILLAGE.Between 1854 and 1869. Oil on paperboard, 18 3/8 x 24 1/2". Paul Mellon
Fig. 11. George Catlin. A SMALL
almost secretfor so long)." It is highly probablethat

Catlin knew of the Brazilianwork of the artistsand
travelersshe mentions, such as JohannMoritzRugendas (1802-1858), Prince Maximilian Alexander
Phillip of Wied-Neuwied(1782-1867), JohannBaptist von Spix (1781-1826), and Carl FriedrichPhillip von Martius (1794-1868). They all published
illustratedaccounts of their trips before the Cartoon
Collection was finished (Fig. 14). But especially
interestingis what Hartmannhas to say aboutPrince
Maximilian. (It might be useful to recall here that
the Prince, accompanied by the Swiss artist Karl

Bodmer [1809-1893], had also traveled along the
Missouri valley, more or at less the same time as
Catlin, in the 1830s.) Maximilian, it is safe to
assume, would have been first in a list of Catlin's
references. But the curious thing is that, had Catlin
relied on the engravings of the Prince's Botocudo
images to complete his own paintingsor to "invent"
them, he would probably have been using a contrivedimage, not the "real"or original one. In Hartmann'swords, "severalsketches by the Prince were

19
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Fig. 12. George Catlin. MEMBERS
TRIBE.Between 1854 and 1869. Oil on paperboard, 15 1/4 x 21 7/8".Paul
Mellon Collection,NationalGalleryofArt.
fused (by the engraver) into compositions which

have little to do with what Maximilianwitnessed."40
The engraversand lithographers,as Hartmannaptly
notes, were not inert mediators. Through them,
many Europeanclich6s about how Indians were to
be represented filtered down to the published
images."4
This lifting of images out of their original context, if coupled with the lack of a criticaleye for distinguishing the cultural traits of a certain group of
Indians,can lead to greatconfusion. Among the real
Botocudo (those located in EasternBrazil), according to Alfred M6traux,lip-disks were used by "men
and women alike."42Catlin's two paintings of the
"Botocudo" show Indians who do not appear to
Fig. 13 (opposite, above). George Catlin. BOTOCUDO

CHIEF,
HISWIFE,ANDA YOUNG
MAN.Between 1854 and 1869. Oil on
paperboard, 18 1/4 x 23 1/2". Paul Mellon Collection,

NationalGalleryofArt.
Fig. 14 (opposite, below). Prince MaximilianAlexander
COMBATS
OFTHEBOTOCUPhillip of Wied-Neuwied. SINGLE
DOS. 1820. Engraving, 6 1/8 x 8 3/4" (image size), from
Prince Maximilian,of Wied-Neuwied,Travelsin Brazil, in

the Years 1815, 1816, 1817 (London,1820). Collection,
GeneralResearchDivision, The New YorkPublic Library,
Astor,Lenoxand TildenFoundations.
20
Krebs/Catlin

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Fig. 15. Photograph of George Catlin taken in Brussels, possibly by Bernheim. c. 1868. Albumen print, image size, 5 x 3". Collection, National Portrait Gallery Library and National
Museum ofAmerican Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington,D.C.

belong to the same group, as noted earlier.It is very

difficult to guess whether he was copying from
"nature,"or very confused about the names of the
tribes, or just generalizingthe lip-disks to make the
Indianslook more bizarre.The curiousandthe monstrous were categories in which, as Hartmannalso
indicates, Indians were sometimes placed at that
time.43In any case, it is clear that as a document of
ethnographicvalue, Catlin's "Botocudo"paintings
are very problematic.
Catlinwas similarlyinaccurateor misleadingin
the names and the localities he gives for otherIndian
groups of northeasternArgentina.The Lengua, the
Toba, and the Mocobi are not associated with the
UruguayRiver, on whose shores Catlinputs them.44
Before criticizing him too harshly for these confusions, however, it must be said that the ethnography
of this particularareais extremely complicated.The
different names the Spanish, the Guarani-speaking
Indians, and the Criollos45gave to the same Indian
groups have hamperedprofessional anthropologists
workingwith historicaldocuments.46It must also be
said in Catlin's defense, thathe realizedhimself that
he might have possibly gone wrong in namingsome
of his cartoons.In the 1871 catalogue he warned:
I had too muchcharacterandtype constantlybefore
me to thinkmuchof Indiannames,andof thosewhich
my menpickedupon theshore,correctlyorincorrectly given,andwhichI hadregistered,I havestruckout
many;andfor the correctnessof the rest(notto misleadanyone),I amunwillingto vouch,beingunderthe
convictionthatmoreor less of themarewrong.47
His brotherFrancis,who visited him in Brussels
in 1868 and kept a diary,provides very useful information on how the South American portraits and
books were produced.Catlin (Fig. 15) had a working routine,waking up early andpaintinguntil it got
dark.Sometimes he bought lunch from a streetvendor, a woman who sold baked potatoes right underneath the window of his studio. Catlin would lower
a string with a handkerchieftied to it, containing
some coins. The woman downstairswould take the
coins and wrap the potatoes in the handkerchief.In
the evenings, Francis went on to say, Catlin would
invariablygo to a cafe, where he wrote his "works,
letters&c." The din in this crowded and lively place
made it unbearablefor Francis,but "Geo... being
In this way,
deaf," he noted, "has no annoyance."48
at a "cafe"table where he had "good gas light" and
was "perfectly at ease," The Lifted and Subsided
Rocks and Last Rambles were produced.49Catlin
seems to have been driven by an obsession to finish
the Cartoon Collection. This included not only the
South American work but also copies, made from
sketches or from memory, of the original North

American portraitslost in the financial collapse of
1852. Catlin did his painting at home in a room
Francisdescribedas "darkand gloomy."He saw his
brother working hard at the paintings, switching
constantlyfrom one cartoonto another,andtellingly
exclaims in the diary, "poorfellow-I wish I could
help him, but no use. I cant make Indians."soIt must
be remembered,also, thatCatlin was almost deaf by
1855-the most likely year for his visit to Argentina-and that once there he had to communicatein
Spanish, a language in which he was not proficient.
The compounded effect of these limitations certainly encourages skepticism when attempting to
assess the value of his ethnographicdatafrom northeasternArgentina.
Catlin's style of writing and his artistic techniques should also be considered. From a literary
point of view, it is obvious that he was not acting as
a scholar.His books never carryreferences,and one
has to take what he offers at face value. Even the
cautionarymeasurehe had resortedto in Lettersand
Notes, namely, adding at the beginning the testimonies of such prominentAmericans as Joel Roberts
Poinsett (1779-1851), Secretary of War, William
Clark (1770-1838), Superintendent of Indian
Affairs, and numerousIndianagents and otherswho
certified the authenticityof Catlin's text, is missing
in the SouthAmericanbooks. Furthermore,he could
not write within the parametersof an ethnographic
tradition,as we understandit today, because such a
traditionhad not yet developed. The closest he came
to meeting its standardswas in his descriptionof the
Mandan O-Kee-Pa ceremony in the area of the
Upper Missouri.5'Catlin's failure to understandthe
significance of some Indian traits and customs, for
example, the lip-disks among the "Botocudo,"was
not unusual among contemporaryaccounts. In his
chapter,"PopulationArgentine,"Martinde Moussy,
referring to descriptions of Indians by travelers,
remarked about some Argentine and Brazilian
groups,thatthey had been "alreadynamedby Azara,
... of whom he cites only the names, after Spix and
Martius, Rugendas, [Jean Baptiste] Debret, Prince
Maximilian, and whose attributes do not appear
clear enough to him to assign them to the firstgroup
or the second."52Sketches and notes jotted down
from a passing canoe cannot really be the basis for
an elaboratedepiction of Indianlife, pictorialor ethnographic. Most of Catlin's paintings of South
American Indians show them as they would have
been seen from a ship or boat (Figs. 16 and 17).3 In
this, for one thing, they could stand as "accurate"
documents.

23
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Between 1854 and 1869. Oil on paperboard, 18 1/2 x 24 5/8".Paul Mellon
Fig. 16. George Catlin. PAINTINGTHELENGUA
From the point of view of a pictorial tradition

that could have aided Catlin's ethnographicefforts
in the 1850s, again the terrainis less thanfirm. Indians were a distant, tantalizingpresence for Europeans-the stuff of fantasy-and certainly not a
frequentedtopic or subject among the masterpainters of Westernart.Indianswere representedvisually
in Europe through the less prestigious medium of
book illustration-in travel accounts, universal
geographies, and collections conveying the curious
and monstrous. Christian Feest and Susi Colin,
among other authors, have convincingly demonstrated that the main value of this line of "ethnographic" art is as a record of changing European
notions of "the Indian"-notions which were,
mostly, based on misconceptions or preconceptions.54It could be arguedthat, from a documentary

perspective,Catlinwas, indeed, freerto try his hand
with the marginaltopic of his choice. But, paradoxically, this same freedom meant that he was faced
with anotherproblem-namely, that of representing
accurately people about whom little was known,
who were-so to speak-without a context. Catlin
had to "invent"a way of doing this. When Rembrandtrepresenteda biblical scene, for instance,the
audience addressedby him knew enough about the
context to interpretthe scene. A man wearing a lipdisk, or a headdressof feathers, on the other hand,
makes less sense because he lacks a context, unless
he is madeto standas an icon of the exotic, but,then,
24
Krebs/Catlin

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URUGUAY.
LENGUA
VILLAGE,
Fig 17. George Catlin. A SMALL
MellonCollection,NationalGalleryofArt.
this is anothermatter.In retrospect,we could argue

thatCatlindid not always solve these problemsvery
well, but at the same time we should acknowledge
that he at least tried. He was most successful when
he focused on personality and the expression of
character-that is, when he paintedportraitsof individual Indians. In other words, Catlin seems at his
best when he was workingwithin a recognizabletradition of Westernart.As JohnEwershas pointedout,
faithfulvisual depictionsof Indianlife are morepossible now, by putting together,ex post facto, a collage of well-certified images, than in the days when
pioneer painters-good observers as they often
were-traveled beyond the frontiers."
Withthis work of visual reconstructionin mind,
Catlinis not the most informativepainteramong the

few who have recorded aspects of Indian life in
northeasternArgentina. Compared to the illustrations made by the Jesuit priest Florifn Paucke
(1719-1780) of his experiences among the Mocobi
of the Argentine Chaco (Figs. 18, 19, 20, and 21),
Catlin's material almost pales to insignificance.
Paucke, born in Silesia, Austria,traveledwith other
Jesuit priests to Argentinain 1748 and worked as a
missionaryin the Chaco region, among the Mocobi,
for eighteen years, until his orderwas expelled from
SpanishAmericain 1767. Back in Austria,when the
Jesuitorderwas eventuallydissolved by Pope Clement XIV in 1773, Paucke took refuge at the Cistercian monasteryin Zwettl, where his hosts prompted

25
-TIL-
i?
AW!
?e
++:+++
.....
++..+
'
'+
,.+
Iwo
THEPARANA
AIDEDBYINDIANS,
CROSSING
PRIESTS,
RIVER.c. 1773. Watercolor.Collection, Stift
Fig. 18. Floridn Paucke. JESUIT
Zwettl (Zwettl Monastery),Zwettl,Austria.Reproducedfrom FloridnPaucke, HaciaA1 y ParaAcd (Una EstadaEntreLos

Indios Mocobfes, 1749-1767), trans. EdmundoWernicke,3 vols. (BuenosAires, 1942-1944). Collection,GeneralResearch
Division,TheNew YorkPublicLibrary,Astor,Lenoxand 7ildenFoundations.
him to write a memoirof his experiencesin the New

World. That is how his manuscripton the Mocobi
originated."6In the preface to this work of 1146
pages and over 100 illustrations,Paucke warns the
reader that what he has to say about the Mocobi
applies to them alone and should not be generalized
because-as in Europe-"ino countryis identical to
another in its customs and manners,"and because
the Indians' "ideas"varied from group to group as
much as their languages and the "countries"they
inhabited. He also warns that different observers
might come up with different perceptions of the
Mocobi, and that the merit of his work rested on its
being the result of direct and prolonged personal
experience. It is not surprisingthat this thoughtful

observer's illustrations,although rustic, are packed
with detail, and provide the modem anthropologist
with a wealth of informationon the Mocobi.
Whether depicting a ceremony or Indian body
decorations,the Silesian Jesuit was more vivid and
illustrative than Catlin. Paucke's images show the
Indiansof the missions in all the complexity of their
syncretic customs. Catlin's penchant for the
"unspoiled"and "wild" did not allow for an unbiased ethnographyof many South American Indian
groups which, by the 1850s, had a long history of
contact with the Spanish and the Portuguese.
Catlin's paintingsof the Toba or the Chaco say
Krebs/Catlin
26

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. ..
.,
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.,,.
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c. 1773. Watercoloron paper. CollecANDARTIFACTS.

WEAPONS
Fig. 19. Floridn Paucke. MOCOBI
tion, Stir Zwettl.
Fig.
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c. 1773. Watercoloron paper. Collection, Stift Zwettl.
TATTOOES
Fig. 21. Floridn Paucke. MOCOBI
moreaboutCatlinhimselfthanaboutthoseIndians
(Figs.22 and23). Tobe fairto Catlin,we shouldtry
to undertandhis singularity,the singularityof his
purpose,of whathe wasintendingto do.Theauthority of boththe IndianGalleryandthe CartoonCollectionderived,accordingto his rationale,fromthe
notionthat,as Paucke,he had"beenthere";thathe
had reachedout beyond the frontierand beyond
Indiansas a worthysubprejudice,andincorporated
art.
if
valueof
for
As
to
the
prove documentary
ject
his work,Catlinoftenpaintedhimselfinto the picture(see Figs. 7, 11 and16). He was as mucha part
of themessageas weretheunknownandfastdisappearingracesandcultureshe wastryingto legitimatize.ThereasonthatPauckecanbe rankedhigheras
an illustratorof Indian customs in northeastern

Argentinais simplythathe spenteighteenyearsin
the Chaco,an experiencewhich enabledhim-as
his splendidstudyof theMocobiproves-to provide
notonlya visualrepresentation
of theMocobiandof
theirmaterialculture,but also meaningfulcontexts
andexplanationswhichroundout the value of his
testimony.In comparisonto Paucke,Catlinwasjust
a passerby,who managed,nevertheless,to communicate his enthusiasmfor his topic, reactingto it
withoutsome of the inhibitionsof better-trained
artists.57
A finalsubject,andone thatprovidesmanyuseful insightsforjudgingCatlin'swork,is thatof illustrationsin newspapersandpopularmagazines,such
28
Krebs/Catlin

Eff
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HISWIFE,ANDA WARRIOR.
Between 1854 and 1869. Oil on paperboard, 17 7/8x 23 15/16".
CHIEF,
Fig. 22. George Catlin. CHACO
Paul MellonCollection,NationalGalleryofArt.
as TheIllustratedLondonNews or Harper's Weekly

for instance, and in romances and novels dealing
with Indians. Fact and fantasy were inextricably
mixed in these images. The artists responsible for
producingthem, more often thannot, had never seen
an Indian, nor had they traveled in distant places.
But to set Catlin'swork in this last context is beyond
the scope of this article.
Leaving behind these general observationson
style and technique, as a body of work Catlin's
South American paintings are noticeably less
accomplished than his North American production
(see Fig. 2). Some similaritiesgive a naggingly uniform, almost formulaic,appearanceto the works he
paintedin the Argentinenortheast.The same type of
bow, the same collars of beads, the same ankle

adornments,reappearin the portraitsof the Chaco,
Payagua, and Toba. Moccasins which have a distinctly NorthAmericanlook areplaced on the feet of
the "Botocudo"(see Figs. 12 and 13) and the quivers
and bows in Figures 10, 12 and 22 are reminiscent
of those used by IndiansCatlinhad seen in his North
American travels. To counter these criticisms, one
should perhapsreturnto Francis Catlin's diary and
recall the environment and the circumstances in
which the paintings were finished. As John Ewers
has observedof the NorthAmericancollection, each
paintinghas to be judged separately."In this sense,
the scene of Lengua Indians (even if the name is
wrong) ascending the rapids of the Uruguay River
TheAmericanArt Journal/VolumeXXIII Number4

29
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BYMOONLIGHT-CHACO.
Between 1854 and 1869. Oil on paperboard, 18 1/2 x 24 3/8". Paul
Fig. 23. George Catlin. SPEARING
MellonCollection,NationalGalleryofArt.
(Fig. 24), could have, because it shows how they did

it, an obvious ethnographic value. The Argentine
northeast,as noted earlier,especially the area of the
UruguayRiver, is sadly lacking in visual representations of Indians.This being the case, furtherresearch
on specific groups should help bring out the documentaryvalue of Catlin's paintings.
So far, there is almost no analyticalliteratureon
the Cartoon Collection. Really the only work that
one could cite is Marvin Ross's introductionto the
edition he put together of Catlin's Life Amongst the
Indians and Last Rambles (1959).59This is a valuable book because it gathers in a single volume
almost everything Catlin wrote on South America
and reproducesnearly all of the surviving paintings
of SouthAmericansubjectmatter.By doing so, Ross
brought this "lost period" back to the attention of
scholars,noting aptly that it is "only by the publication of all Catlin's significant work and the evaluation of it by anthropologistsand art historiansthat
we can arrive at a true estimate of this remarkable
man."6 But in his introductionRoss never doubts
that Catlin went to South America and is seemingly
unawareof the many problemsposed by the region's
complex ethnohistory.He claims, though, to have
comparedCatlin'spaintingswith "a large numberof
artifacts and photographs, collected about 1900
among some of the same [South American] tribes"
and to have found "to my satisfaction"that Catlin
"notonly correctlyrenderedthe Indiansthemselves,
but had observedand paintedfaithfullytheirmanner
of dress and the ornamentsthey wore."'' This is a
very optimistic statement,one which Ross does not
substantiate.Collections of photographs of South
30
Krebs/Catlin

'ail
Fig. 24. George Catlin. LENGUAINDIANSASCENDINGTHERAPIDSOF THERIOURUGUAY. Between 1854 and 1869. Oil on paper-
board, 18 11/16x 24 13/16".Paul Mellon Collection, National Gallery ofArt.
AmericanIndians-and Ross does not directus to a

precise reference-can say many things to different
observers.What is difficult to avoid noticing when
working with such collections is that Indian ornamentationand "mannerof dress" are not static but
tend to vary, much in the same way as fashions in
our own cosmopolitan culturedo. How, then, could
Ross be so certain in his comments? What groups,
what periods, was he comparingand assimilating?
Regarding the change of style between the
Indian Gallery and the Cartoon Collection, Ross,
drawingfrom Catlin's own words, has this to say in
his book:
Catlinfound,whilepaintingin thejungle,thathe must
devise a differentmethodof working.In the 1830's,
when he first recordedthe Indiansin paint,he used
canvas,whichhad to be rolledup andpackedwhile
traveling.Thiswasnotsuccessfulin thehumidclimate
of theSouthAmericanjungleswherepainton thecanvas driedslowly,andso he switchedto Bristolboard,
which was more easily packedand carriedand on
whichpaintdriedmorequickly.62
But it is just as importantto relateCatlin'schange of
techniqueto his concern to have his paintingsof Indian life taken as documents,as representationsthat
were trueto the facts. If we examine the way Indians
are shown in the CartoonCollection, we notice how
much the static Indianfigures, lined up flatly in the
Bristol boards, resemble those in a studio photograph.The techniqueof photography-one thatwas
supposed to reproducereality-had become available after the IndianGallery was completed, and its
possibilities for science were extolled by no less a
It is
figure thanHumboldt,one of Catlin'smentors.63

31
't7
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lip
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t
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. ... :, ,: ..
.?t
"'- i'"
..
DELGRAN
CHACO
(REPUBLICA
ARGENTINA).
1864-1865. Lithograph,7 7/16 x 12 15/16".
Fig. 25. Jean LdonPallibre.INDIOS
Privatecollection.
plausibleto think that Catlinmight have triedto

mimica photographic
stylein his latercollectionof
paintings,borrowingfromthenewtechnique'sprestige in an attemptto make the paintings look more
documentary. Other painters of Indians, such as
JohnMix Stanley(1814-1872) for instance,used

as an aid. JeanLeonPallibredid, too,
photography
andit is interestingin this contextto comparetwo
lithographshe made of Indiansof the Argentine
Chaco,afterhavingtraveledtherein the 1850s.One
showsa couplein a canoe(Fig.25). Thesettingand
the atmosphereare of a kindwith otherEuropean,
romanticized,depictionsof Indianlife. The other,
original,showsa group
paintedaftera photographic
and is
of Indiansstaringat the photographer-painter,
in
bare
different
and
direct
very
style:
(Fig.26).64In
fact, the two lithographsappearas if they are the

workof differentartists.Catlinseemsto havebeen
aware of the value of photographyfor his documentarywork. In a passage fromLast Rambles,referring

to a dance scene in a Zurumativillage, he exclaims:
"Andoh, thata photographic

impressioncouldhave
been taken of this singularpretty group, which
wouldhavevanishedlike a flockof antelopeshadI
attemptedto have made a sketch of it."65When com-
and"documentary"
paringPallibre's"fictional"
representationsof Chaco Indians,and Catlin'sown
strikingportraitsof NorthAmericanIndians(when
his modelsposed for him, and he could gradually
numerousdetailsto thecanvas)withthe
incorporate
manynondescript
imagesof theCartoonCollection,
one wishes he had dependedmore on "photographic"impressions,as mentionedin the passage
just quoted.
And whataboutCatlin'snarrativesof his trips
in SouthAmerica?Althoughhe wasthe firstto draw
32
Krebs/Catlin

., ,
iti
?,,
I",~lIr
IUY~
Ll~Yi~
ARGENTINA).
Fig. 26. Jean Lion Palli re. TOBAS.INDIOSDELGRANCHACO(REPUBLICA
from Leon Palliere:Escenasamericanas,reproduccionde cuadros,aquarellesy

Reproduced
bosquejos(BuenosAires, 1980). Photograph,GettyCenterfor the Historyof Art and the
Humanities,SantaMonica,California.

IX.
Fig. 27. Rodolfo Kratzenstein,after Carlos Pellegrini.

A. BONPLAN
(AIMPBONPLAND).
Lithograph, 5 15/16x 5 1/8",
fromRevistadel Plata(November,1854). Privatecollection.
attentionto them, Ross did not thoroughlyexamine

this material.Assuming for a momentthe worst possible case-that Catlin invented these texts altogether-what could have been his most likely
sources?Let us take, for example, our main concern
in this article, the trips in northeasternArgentina.
There was plenty of printed material available on
this areaby 1850. Withoutpretendingto cover the
entirefield, the obvious choices in book form arethe
works by Alcide d'Orbigny (1835-1847 and 1836),
WoodbineParish(1839), and JohnP. andWilliam P.
Robertson(1843).67
Alcide d'Orbigny's Voyage dans L'Amdrique
M ridionaleis the best and most detailed accountof

the Argentine Indians published before 1850. This
work includes a classification of Indian groups by
race and language which stands as a pioneering
effort of a considerably high standard.D'Orbigny,
besides, had spent almost a year in the province of
Corrientesduringthe extensive travels in which he
collected his ethnographicinformation.
The worksby WoodbineParishand the Robertson brothers are less ambitious in scope but very
pertinentfor the historyand geographyof the areaof
Catlin'sjourney.Both were publishedby JohnMurray, in London, around the time Catlin was there.
Murray was a friend of Catlin and had recommended that he publish Letters and Notes on his
own, so thathe would not have to sharethe profits.
Even supposingthatCatlinwas acquaintedwith
these authorsand allowing for his shortcomings(no
notes, no references, no "certificates"as in Letters
and Notes) and for all his mistakes and omissions,
Catlin's narrativeof his trips in northeasternArgentina, although superficial and random, reads as if
based on an authenticpersonalexperience.No obvious instance of plagiarismcan be isolated; the itinerary is reasonable and could have been followed
using the means of transportationcited; and Catlin,
althoughnearlydeaf, was still strong and fit enough
to endureit."
This is a favorable and perhaps too optimistic
readingof Catlin's own story. It has to be balanced
against the rather serious doubts and questions
which have been raised already. First, there is the
question promptedby a simple bird's-eye view of
the entire SouthAmerican "period."As noted at the
beginningof this article,the itinerariesCatlinlists in
the catalogue of his New Yorkexhibition are extensive. The first of these takes Catlin and his assistant
CesarBolla to the OrinocoandAmazon basins, from
the Amazonianrain forest across the Andes to Peru;
from there by ship to San Francisco, and farther
north on board the Sally Anne to the Bering Strait.
Back in the United States, Catlin and Bolla continue
traveling on horseback across the Rockies and
finally to the Yucatan,where they partcompany.The
second trip, which looks more self-contained and
feasible, takes Catlin to Rio de Janeiroand the Rio
de la Plata,where JuanAlzar comes into the picture
as his guide. We should also rememberthat while in
Argentina,besides travelingin the northeast,he venturedacross the Pampason horseback,and by ship,
to Patagonia.69
It is one thing is to merely list these ratherambitious traveling routes, and quite another to follow
them on a map, bearing in mind Catlin's often con-
34
Krebs/Catlin

tradictorytimetables, and the considerabledifficulties involved in traversing some of the areas

adduced.The whole frameworklooks shaky,if seen
from this perspective.
Second, Catlin's travels in Argentinaacross the
Pampasand to Patagoniaappear,after close examination, to be as ambiguous in terms of the supporting evidence, as the one we havejust reviewed along
the Parandand Uruguayrivers.70Of these two trips,
the single most important piece of evidence that
could help to prove Catlin's presencein Argentinais
a Tehuelche-Englishvocabulary,which he collected
through an interpreterwhile "wind-bound"on the
northern shore of the Strait of Magellan.71The
vocabulary shows some reassuring parallels with
one published later by George Musters (1873)72 but
it has so many similarities with the lesser-known
vocabulary published by Dr. Theophilus Schmid,
catechist of the PatagonianMissionary Society, in
1860, seven years before Last Rambles, that it is
highly likely that Catlinborrowedfrom it.73
And last, there is the question of the visit to
Aim6 Bonpland (Fig. 27), mentioned earlier.
Strangelyenough, Catlin gives no descriptionin his
narrativeof the encounterwith the old botanist.The
meeting, though, is mentionedon at least three separateoccasions by Catlin, as if it had taken place: in
the itineraryof the 1871 catalogue;in a letter to his
English patronSir Thomas Phillipps (November 3,
1857)74;and in the Appendix to The Liftedand Subsided Rocks ofAmerica. In that book one reads:
... whilstin Uruguay,in 1856,at theresidenceof the
BaronBonpland,to whomtheBaronde Humboldt
had
I receiveda letter
given me a letterof introduction,
fromtheBaronde Humboldt...75
Leaving aside the fact that Bonpland was not a
"Baron,"the date of this letter is problematic:June
9, 1856. How did Catlin get hold of that letter if,
accordingto our assumption,it is most likely thathe
was travelingpast Bonpland'splace aroundJanuary
or Februaryof the same year?
If one moves the dates of the Argentineitineraries forward,to allow for the time frame implied by
this letter,then when would the trips on the Pampas
and to Patagoniahave to be placed, consideringthat
Catlin, in his own words, left the countryat the end
of 1856? If Catlin'sarrivalin Buenos Aires occurred
later than December 15, 1855, the hypothetical
meeting with LieutenantPage has to be ruled out,
and the descriptionsof hot weatherand the low level
of the watersin the upperParandRiver-details that
are otherwise credible---donot seem to fit.
Moving the trip to Argentina ahead to 1858,
when, according to the correspondence with Sir

Thomas Phillipps, Catlin might have been abroad,
will not do either.76
Bonplanddied in May, 1858.77
One serious possibility is that Catlin never met
Bonpland, and never received the 1856 letter from
Humboldt.This also implies that Catlin could have
invented the letter. Bonpland was certainly very
active in 1855 and 1856. He used to move from the
establishmentin SantaAna on the west bank of the
Uruguay River-where the encounter with Catlin
supposedly took place-across the river to Sdo
Borja, in Brazil, where he had another estancia or
ranch,andalso to Montevideo,where he would periodically collect a pension from the French government. El Comercioreportedin its issue of February
2, 1856:
andfriendof
AmadoBonpland,the learnednaturalist
haswrittento ourGoverourProvince[of Corrientes]
norfromMontevideo,informinghimhe hascollected
severalmineralsin thatState,withthe worthyideaof
donatingthem,on his return,to thelocalmuseumthat
is beingestablishedunderhis direction.He will also
bringtreesandseedsof plantsunknownto us, to grow
andacclimatizethemhere...
This piece of news was followed in the issue of
February24 with the informationthat anotherletter
had been received by His Excellency, the Governor
of Corrientes,from Bonpland, then on his way up
the Uruguay River with his load of minerals and
plants."Wecannotwait,"wrote the unknownchronicler of the local column, "to see the gentle naturalist
among us." Had Catlin tried to visit Bonpland in
Januaryor February,he would probablyhave found
that the Frenchman was elsewhere collecting his
pension and items for the museum. The chances for
both men meeting appearas very slim.
Another curious thing about Humboldt's 1856
letter is that Thomas Donaldson publishes a transcriptionof it in his memoir,withoutmakingit clear
whether he saw the actual document, or was just
quotingit from Catlin'sLiftedand SubsidedRocks.78
Donaldson reproduces other documents in facsimile, but not this particularone.
What motives might have led Catlin into this
possible deception?An answer could be the appearance of Henry Rowe Schoolcraft's six-volume Historical and Statistical Information Respecting the
History, Condition and Prospects of the North
American Indians (Philadelphia, 1851-1857) or,
rather,Catlin's first public acknowledgment of it,
some years later.79Relations between Catlin and
Schoolcraft had deterioratedafter the artist refused
to illustratethat very same work when it was still in

35
project form. In the years before anthropologywas

an establisheddiscipline, its self-styled practitioners
andpioneershad to face the difficult task of cajoling
the government and private patrons into providing
financial support and recognition. In the United
States, until the Smithsonian Institution was
founded in 1846, and later on, the Bureauof American Ethnology, there were no museums or specific
academic positions which would allow for a career
in anthropology.80A special appropriation from
Congress was the haven for which Catlin, Schoolcraft, Stanley, and others of theirkind lobbied-and
in this particularart Schoolcraft ("a man," Catlin
said "whose easy task was to sit in his parlour in
Washington"in the "enjoymentof a salarywith perquisites to compose a book from the gatheringsof
others"81)had the upper hand. In the letter in question, Humboldt warns Catlin that the book by
Schoolcraft, published "under the authority of the
Governmentof the UnitedStates,"puts in doubt the
truthof Catlin'sdescriptionsof the Mandanceremonies. Catlin had visited this NorthAmericantribe in
the 1830s, and vividly described and painted its
rites, in all theirrawness and apparentcruelty.Humboldt informedCatlin in his 1856 letter that Schoolcraft undermined his reputation by "distinctly
saying" the descriptions "are contraryto facts, and
that they are the works of your imagination,& c."82
He then suggested that Catlin write to Prince Maximilian, who had traveledthroughthe same Mandan
village accompaniedby the painterBodmer,and ask
him for a letter of support. This letter, Humboldt
ended, if placed togetherwith Catlin's own defense
before the United States government,could not fail
to induce "some legislative act, to do you justice."83
Catlin did precisely that, in 1868. His presentation to Congress carried the prestigious names of
Humboldt (who had died in 1859), of Bonpland
(who had also died, in 1858), and of PrinceMaxmilian to bolster his case-a case, one should add,
which was not only an indictmentof Schoolcraft's
book, but also of the government'spolicy towardthe
Indians.This is all based on the letter Catlin claims
to have collected at the Bonplandresidence,in 1856.
His letter to the Prince, though, is dated December
2, 1866, in Brussels. No less than ten years had
passed between Humboldt'speremptoryadvice and
Catlin's reaction.
Coming to a confident conclusion about
whether Catlin did or did not go to South America
will remaindifficult unless unequivocalevidence of
his travels is produced-evidence coming from
sources other thanhis own paintings and narratives.
Until this happens, only conjectures-more or less
reasonable--can be presented,in favor and against.

We do know that most of the trips he claims to have
made were feasible. We also know that the stringof
ethnographicdata he blends into the South American books was alreadyaccessible in print.Certainly,
he could have traveledin his imagination,simply by
reading books in a Paris or Brussels library.84The
possibility that he combined fact and fiction is very
likely.
There is, yet, something else instructiveabout
Catlin's "lost period": it reveals that the kind of
questioningof his credibilityhas shifted significantly. His contemporarycritics, Schoolcraftand others,
accused him not of inventing itinerariesbut of misrepresenting Indian character.What Catlin had to
say about it was too good to be accepted as real or
regardedas accurateand trueto the facts. His "documents"were contestedbecause they challengedthe
dominant way in which Indian cultures were perceived at that time-as backward, savage, and almost incapable of "rational thinking.""5Catlin
explicitly questioned these judgments. He advocated direct personal experience and "living amongst
them,"before coming to conclusions. In Last Rambles, he wrote:
Whenthe scienceof humanethnology,whichhas
beenforsomethousandsof yearstravellingto thewest
withthe advanceof civilization,gets quitearoundthe
globe it will probablybe seen whethertherehas not
beensomeerroratits starting-point-error
as its basis,
errorheapeduponerroras it hasadand,consequently,
vanced.Whethererroneousdogmas,travellingwith
the wave of civilization,have not been too muchthe
establishedruleby whichall thingsethnologicalin the
NewWorldshouldbe measured;andwhethertrueethnologicalknowledgeof a peopleis bestdrawnfroman
independent
studyof thosepeopleandtheirhabits,or
from the applicationof an ethnologicaleducation
drawnfrombooks,madefrombooks,withall thedogmaticalrulesthathavebeenmadefor,andappliedto,
otherpeoples?86
This sounds very reasonable, by today's standards.
We have now shied away from believing, as many
once did, that Indians are exemplars of a savage
phase of human evolution. Anthropologists,as Catlin foresaw, are expected these days to draw their
knowledge of a people from an "independentstudy"
and from being there. Hence our brand of concern
regarding his South American work: we have
grounds to suspect that, against his own prescribed
method,Catlin might not have been "there"to begin
with--or at least not to the extent he would have us
believe.
In presenting a document of Indian life, Catlin
was not blessed with a supportive audience. In the
36
Krebs/Catlin

nineteenthcentury,he was doubtedto thepointthat

his facts were consideredfiction.Ethnography,
as
Catlinpracticedit, hadfew followersthen,andwas
not a legitimateoccupation.For this reason he
workedin a financialvoid andhis careerwas a failure.Today,we thinkdifferentlyaboutwhatconstitutesa documentand are an appreciativeaudience
forCatlin'sinitialandmainwork:theIndianGallery
andLettersand Notes. We are also moreawareof

some of the problemsencounteredby artistsand
writerswho attemptto portrayothercultures.If the
quaintproductsof the "lost period,"the South
Americanyears,do belongto the realmof fantasy
and the imagination,they are at least a truedocument of Catlin'splight, of the isolationthat bred
them.
I wouldlike to expressmy gratitudeto TomL. Freudenheim,

AssistantSecretaryfor Museums,SmithsonianInstitution,Washington,
D.C., for facilitating,in manyways, my initialresearchon Catlin.I
wouldalso like to thankVeronicaandMarceloElissetche,for their
friendshipand hospitalityin Washington,D.C., and to Fundacion
Antorchas,of BuenosAires,Argentina,forthegenerousscholarship
thatmademy studiesat Oxfordpossible.
Fordiscussingthistopic withme, I am gratefulto WilliamC. Sturtevant,Curatorof NorthAmericanEthnology,SmithsonianInstitution,JohnC. Ewers,EthnologistEmeritus,SmithsonianInstitution,
and BrianW. Dippie, Professorof History,Universityof Victoria,
Victoria,BritishColumbia.WolfsonCollege,Oxford,andthe InterfacultyCommitteefor LatinAmericanStudies,OxfordUniversity,
awardedme a travelgrantin November,1989, with which I was
able to follow Catlin'sroutein northeasternArgentina.For their
support,I am sincerelythankful.
I wouldlike to acknowledgeBonifacioP. del Carrilof Emec6EditoresS.A., BuenosAires,andKarinRacklof theEmbassyof theRepublic of Austria, Washington,D.C., for their kind assistance.
Finally,I wouldalso like to thankJaneVanN. TuranoandJayneA.
Kuchna,editorsof TheAmericanArt Journal,for theirthoroughness andfor manyhelpfulobservations.
1. GeorgeCatlin,Lettersand Notes on the Manners,Customs,and
Conditionof the North AmericanIndians, 2 vols. (1841; New
York,1973),vol. 1, pp. 2, 4.
2. JosephHarrison'swidow, Sarah,donatedCatlin'scollectionto
the SmithsonianInstitutionin 1879. It is now at the National
Museumof AmericanArt, SmithsonianInstitution,Washington,
D.C.
the Museumsold it to PaulMellon who, in turn,donatedthe bulk

of it to the NationalGalleryof Art, Washington,D.C. Twenty-four
of the worksare at the VirginiaMuseumof Fine Arts,Richmond,
Virginia.Othersare scatteredin museum collectionsthroughout
the UnitedStates.
The books derived from the South Americantrips are Life
Amongstthe Indians(London,1861); Last RamblesAmongstthe
Indiansof the RockyMountainsand theAndes(New York,1867);
and The Liftedand SubsidedRocks of America(London, 1870).
The firstborrowsfromhis previoustexts on his experiencesin the
North Americanfrontierand also includestales of travelsin the
Orinocoand Amazonbasins.The secondgives a differentversion
of the lattertravelsandrecountsthe storyof hisjourneysin Argentina. Liftedand SubsidedRocksdrawsfrom the previoustwo and
includesCatlin'stheorieson the originof the Andesandthe origin
anddistributionof "races"in NorthandSouthAmerica.
3. The mostrecentandcomprehensiveworkson CatlinareWilliam

Truettner,TheNaturalMan Observed.A Studyof Catlin'sIndian
Gallery (Washington,D.C., 1979); and Brian W. Dippie, Catlin
and His Contemporaries:The Politics of Patronage (Omaha,
Nebr., 1990).
4. The CartoonCollection numbersover six hundredpaintings.
Approximatelyhalf are reproductionsof the originalIndianGallery. Accordingto BrianDippie, Catlinand His Contemporaries,
pp. 355-356,
Catlinhad copied most of his originalportraitsbetween 1848
and 1852 using a photographiclens (cameralucida)to reproduce headsand torsos,addingthe bottomhalvesfromsketches
made,he claimed,from life. These... were storedseparately
from his originalIndianGalleryand thus escapedhis English
creditors.... In the 1860s he transferredthe outlinesto pasteboardpanelsconsistentin size and style with his SouthAmerican cartoons;thus Catlin's"new"or second Indiancollection,
numberingover six hundredpaintingswhen he exhibitedthem
in 1870 to signalhis returnfromobscurity.
In 1910 the collection was purchasedfrom Catlin'sdaughtersby
the AmericanMuseumof NaturalHistoryin New York. In 1965
5. See LastRambles,pp. 46-77. Accordingto GeorgeCatlin,Catlin's Notes of Eight Years' Travelsand Residencein Europe,2
vols. (New York, 1848), vol. 1, p. 39, one of Catlin's friendsin
London,duringthe 1840s, was Sir FrancisBond Head, who had
gone to Argentinain the 1820s with the purposeof startinga mining companyin that country.Catlin's and Sir Francis'sprojects
were very similar.See Sir FrancisBondHead,JourneysAcrossthe
PampasandAmongtheAndes(London,1828).
6. HaroldMcCracken,George Catlinand the Old Frontier(New
York, 1959),pp. 201-209; andLloydHaberly,Pursuitof theHorizon (New York, 1948),pp. 183-219.
7. [GeorgeCatlin],CatalogueDescriptiveand Instructiveof Catlin's IndianCartoons(New York, 1871).
8. These records, though, labelled "Entradasde ultramar"and
"Entradasde pasajeros,"are not altogetherreliable.I searchedfor
Catlin's name in the available documents spanningfrom July,
1855, to December,1856. I am not aware,either, that his name
appearsin any contemporaryaccounts by other travelersin the
area.
9. The Rio de la Plata,or the RiverPlate,is the namegiven to the
greatestuarybetweenArgentinaand Uruguay.The namehas also
beenappliedto the entireriversystemof the Parand,Paraguay,and
SouthAmerica.
Uruguay,drainingsoutheastern-central
10. The letter is reproducedin Thomas Donaldson,The George
CatlinIndianGalleryin the U.S. NationalMuseum(Smithsonian
Institution)with Memoir and Statistics, Annual Report of the
Board of Regents of the SmithsonianInstitution,Washington,
D.C., part5 (1886), p. 713.
11. Bonplandhas not hada biographeryet. Interestinginformation
abouthim can be foundin A. Castellanos,"Bonplanden los paises
del Plata,"Revistade la AcademiaColombianade Ciencias,vol.
XII, no. 45 (n.d.).
12. Catlin,LastRambles,pp. 206, 207.

37
13. [Jean]
Pallibre,Diario de Viajepor La Americadel sud
L.onArgentina,[1945]), pp. 82-84. Jean
Pallibre,
(BuenosAires,
in France,
L.on
born in Rio de Janeiroto Frenchparentsand trained
traveledin SouthAmericain the 1850s.
26. SonzogniandRamirez,Corrientes,p. 41.

27. Catlin,LastRambles,pp. 217-218.
14. Catlin,LastRambles,p. 209.
29. LieutenantPageused royalroads,too, whentravelingon horseback in Argentina(McVaugh,"BotanicalCollections of the La

PlataExpedition,"p. 77).
30. See RobertBontineCunninghameGraham,A VanishedArcadia-Being SomeAccountof the Jesuits in Paraguay 1607-1767
(1901;reprint,London,1988),p. 33.
31. Catlin,Last Rambles,pp. 221, 223, 226-230, 240-246. Catlin
places the Toba on the UruguayRiver but theirknown historical
locationwas to the west of the ParandRiver-in whattodayarethe
Argentineprovincesof ChacoandFormosa.
15. The relationof ThomasJeffersonPage with Argentinais interesting.It was only by chancethathe cameto commandthe expedition to the Rio de la Plata. While serving in China, he had
conceivedthe idea of organizingan explorationof the ChinaSea
and forwardeda proposalto the Secretaryof the Navy. The proposalwas well received,but LieutenantPage did not have the high
rankdeemednecessaryto commandsuch an expedition.The commandwas given to MatthewPerry,andPage was sent, in compensation, to explore the tributariesof the Rio de la Plata. The
Dictionaryof AmericanBiography(s.v. "Page,ThomasJefferson")
states that aftercompletingthis mission he returnedto Argentina
andboughtan "Estancia"in the provinceof EntreRios. For early
commercialinterestof the UnitedStatesin the Rio de la Plataarea,
see BenjaminKeen'sDavid CurtisDe Forestand theRevolutionof
Buenos Aires (1947; Westport,Conn., 1970). John Hoyt Williams's TheRise and Fall of the ParaguayanRepublic,1800-1870
(Austin,Tex., 1979), is very informativeon Page's expeditionand
includessome passingremarkson Bonpland.
16. More informationon the daguerreotypecameraand on other
aspectsof the WaterWitchexpeditioncan be foundin Lieutenant
Page's correspondencewith the Secretaryof the Navy at the
NationalArchives,Naval RecordsCollections,Offices of Naval
Records and Libraries(Record Group 45, letters from officers
commandingexpeditions,entryno. 25).
For a shortbut informativesummaryof earlyphotographyin
Argentina,see JuanGomez, "Photographyin Argentina:History
and Evolutionin the 19thCentury,"Historyof Photography,vol.
XIV, no. 2 (April-June,1990),pp. 181-193.
17. More informationabout Palmer can be found in Rogers
McVaugh,"BotanicalCollectionsof the La Plata Expeditionof
1853-1855," Brittonia,vol. 5, no. 1 (1943), pp 64-79; and in the
biographyby the same author,EdwardPalmer,Plant Explorerof
theAmericanWest(Norman,Okla., 1956). Thereis a laterbiography by Janice J. Beaty, Plants in his Pack, A Life of Edward
Palmer,AdventurousBotanistand Collector(New York,1964).
18. Catlin,LastRambles,pp. 209-210.
19. I lookedfor Alzar'snamein the foldercontainingPage'scorrespondencewith the Secretaryof the UnitedStatesNavy andother
papers related to the Water Witch Expedition at the National
Archives,in Washington,D.C. Alzar'snamedoes not appearin the
list of salariedmembersof the expeditionto the Rio de la Plata.In
connectionwith this, it is interestingto readwhatPalmer'sbiographer-Rogers McVaugh-had to say aboutsearchingfor his name
in the Navy's records:"I searchedamongthe archivesof the Navy
Departmentin 1943 but could not find any recordof his having
beenofficiallyenrolledin the Navy. His nameappearsincidentally
on the medicalrecordsin the log of the WaterWitch"(McVaugh,
EdwardPalmer,p. 10). No suchincidentalluckwithAlzar'sname.
20. GeorgeJ. R. Gordon,"Reportto LordAberdeenon his Visit to
Paraguay,1842,"London,PublicRecordsOffice, F.O. 13/102,pp.
101-131.
21. MariaSonzogniandMirtaRamirez,Lapoblacidnde la ciudad
de Corrientesa mediadosdel siglo XIX (Corrientes,Argentina,
1980),p. 21.
22. El Comercio,October10, 1854.
23. Ibid.,July 12, 1855.
25. Ibid.
28. Ibid.,pp. 219, 220.
32. BronislavaSusnik, Dimensiones migratoriasy pautas culturales de los pueblos del Gran Chaco y su periferia. Enfoque
etnol6gico(Chaco,Arg., 1972);andHeleneClastres,La terresans
mal; le prophetisme Tupi-Guarani(Paris, 1975). The several
linguisticfamily are widely
groupsbelongingto the Tupf-Guaranf
dispersedin South America, mainly along its eastern, Atlantic
coast. The groups in northeasternArgentinamarkthis linguistic
family'ssouthernmostlocation.
33. See chapterby Miguel AlbertoBartolomein Augusto Roa
Bastos,ed., Las CulturasCondenadas(MexicoCity, 1980).
34. F61ixde Azara,quotedin BartolomeMitre,Catalogorazonado
de las lenguasde America(BuenosAires, 1974),p. 557.
36. AnthonySeeger, "TheMeaningof Body Ornaments,"
Ethnology, vol. XIV (1975), p. 212.
37. For furtherdiscussion of these matters,see Seeger, "Body
Ornaments,"and AnthonySeeger, Natureand Society in Central
Brazil: The Suya Indians of Mato Grosso (Cambridge,Mass.,
1981).
38. J. C. H. King, "Familyof BotocudosExhibitedin BondStreet,
in 1822,"in ChristianF. Feest, ed., Indiansand Europe:An InterdisciplinaryCollectionof Essays (Aachen,West Germany,1987),
pp. 243-251.
39. TheklaHartmann,A contribuid-oda iconografiapara o conhecimentode Indiosbrasileirosdo sdculoXIX(Sio Paulo,Brazil,
1975).
40. Ibid.,p. 13.
41. One of Maximilian'soriginalsshows a Botocudomale,with a
lip-disk,leadinga prisoner.A separateoriginalshows a Botocudo
woman,also with a lip-disk,carryinga child on her shoulders.In
the published version, the engraver combined the images and
the figure of the Botocudo womanreplacedthe prisonerWvith
who is also representedwearinga lip-disk--and her child. Other
changesof detail were also made. See Figures48, 46, and 47 in
Hartmann,IndiosBrasileiros,pp. 196-197.
42. Alfred M6traux,
"The Botocudo,"in JulianH. Steward,ed.,
Handbookof SouthAmericanIndians(Washington,D.C., 1946),
vol. I, p. 534.
43. Hartmann,Indiosbrasileiros,p. 13.
44. In Last Rambles,pp. 234, 249, Catlinrefersto the Mocobi, a
tribeof the ArgentineChaco,as "Bocobi."
45. A native of Latin Americaof European,especially Spanish,
descent.
46. LudwigKersten,Las tribus indfgenasdel Gran Chaco hasta
fines-delsigo XVIII(Resistencia,Chaco,1968);andJose A. Braunstein, Algunos rasgos de la organizacidnsocial de los indlgenas
38
Krebs/Catlin

del Gran Chaco, Trabajosde Etnologia,Universidadde Buenos

Aires, Facultad de Filosffa y Letras, Instituto de Ciencias
Antropol6gicas,no. 2, 1983.
47. CatalogueDescriptiveand Instructive,p. 89.
48. MarjorieCatlinRoehm,The Lettersof George Catlinand his
Family(Berkeley,Calif., 1966),p. 355.
49. Ibid.,p. 360.
50. Ibid.,p. 367.
51. See essay by John C. Ewers in George Catlin,O-Kee-Pa,A
Religious Ceremonyand other Customsof the Mandans (New
Haven,Conn.,1967),ed. JohnC. Ewers.
52. Martinde Moussy,Descriptiongeographiqueet statistiquede
la Confederation
Argentine,3 vols. (Paris,1860),p. 147.
53. Of Catlin'sSouthAmericanpaintingsreproducedin MarvinC.
Ross, ed., George Catlin:Episodesfrom Life Amongthe Indians
and Last Rambles(Norman,Okla., 1959), thirty-sevenare scenes
of riversor of Indiansas they wouldhavelookedwhenseen froma
boat;thirty-fiveshow variousIndiangroupsfacingthe painter;and
the remainingtwenty-eightare landscapes.
54. ChristianF. Feest, "Indiansand Europe?Editor'sPostscript,"
pp. 609-624, and Susi Colin, "The Wild Man and the Indianin
Early16thCenturyBook Illustrations,"
pp. 5-29, in Feest,Indians
and Europe.
55. Catlin,O-Kee-PaCeremony,pp. 79-95.
56. Floriin Paucke,Hacia Alldy Para Acd (Una EstadaEntreLos
IndiosMocobles, 1749-1767), trans.EdmundoWernicke,3 vols.
(BuenosAires, 1942-1944).
57. For a fullerdiscussionof Catlinand Frenchartists,see Robert
N. Beetem, "GeorgeCatlin in France:His Relationshipto DelacroixandBaudelaire,"
Art Quarterly,vol. 24 (1961), pp. 129-144.
58. JohnC. Ewers,"FactandFictionin the DocumentaryArtof the
AmericanWest," in John FrancisMcDermott,ed., The Frontier
Re-examined(Urbana,Ill., 1967).
59. Ross, GeorgeCatlin,pp. xix-xiv.
60. Ibid.,pp. xxv.
61. Ross, GeorgeCatlin,pp. xxii-xxiii.
62. Ibid.,pp. xx-xxi.
63. RolandRecht,La lettrede Humboldt(Paris,1989).
64. Forbiographicalinformationon Pallibre,his trainingas an artist in Europe,and his travelsand workin SouthAmerica,see Pallibre,Diario de Viaje.
66. For a discussion of nineteenth-centurytravel accounts of
Argentinaby Britishauthors,see KristineJones,"NineteenthCenturyBritishTravelAccountsof Argentina,"Ethnohistory,vol. 33,
no. 2 (1986), pp. 195-211.
67. See Alcide Dessalines d'Orbigny,Voyage dans L'Amdrique
Mdridionale,9 vols. (Paris, 1835-1847) and VoyagePittoresque
dans les deuxAmdriques(Paris, 1836);WoodbineParish,Buenos
Ayresand theProvincesof the Ridde la Plata (London,1839);and
John P. and William P. Robertson,Letterson SouthAmerica,3
vols. (London,1843).
68. See biographicalsketchesin Donaldson,George CatlinIndian
Gallery,pp. 710-718, 772-773.
69. I use the expression"self-contained"
and"feasible"in connection to Catlin'strip to Argentina,becausethat is how it looks in
comparisonto his other, lengthy trip in South America.A ship

couldhavetakenCatlinfromEuropeto BuenosAires,andit would
have beenfeasiblefor him to successivelybranchout fromthereto
the northeast,the Pampas,and Patagonia.In contrast,the prospect
of muddlingthroughthe rainforestsof the Orinocoand Amazon
basins,andcrossingthe Andes,appearsmuchmoreproblematic.
70. See EdgarC. Krebs,"GeorgeCatlinand the ArgentineIndians," M. Phil. thesis, Instituteof Social Anthropology,Oxford,
1990.
72. George Musters,At Home with the Patagonians (London,
1873).
73. TheophilusSchmid's Vocabularyand Rudimentsof Grammar
of the TsonecaLanguagewas publishedin Bristol, England,in
1860. I would like to thankDr. Rodolfo Casamiquelain Viedma,
Rio Negro, for examiningthe vocabularyby Catlinand pointing
out to me its similaritiesto thatby Schmid.
74. Letterfrom Catlinto Phillipps,November3, 1857, Thomas
GilcreaseInstituteof AmericanHistoryandArt,Tulsa,Oklahoma.
75. Catlin,Liftedand SubsidedRocks,pp. 220-221.
76. BrianDippie has studiedthe relationshipbetweenCatlinand
Sir ThomasPhillipps.See Dippie, Catlinand His Contemporaries.
77. The dates that make more sense to me, regardingthe trip to
Argentina,would follow from Catlin'sown statementthathe left
Europefor South Americain the fall of 1855. He would have
arrivedin Buenos Aires by November-December,
the same year,
more or less at the beginningof the southernhemisphere'ssummer.Hadhe thengone up the ParandRiver,he wouldhaveencounteredheat, mosquitoes,anddwindlinglevels of waterin the river,
as he indeedmentions.Upon returningto Buenos Airesin the fall
he couldhave organizedan excursionon horseback
(March-April),
in the Pampasandreturnedto thatsamecity in time to catcha ship
to the Straitof Magellanat the end of the winter(August-September). The trafficby sea with the Straitalmost ceased duringthe
winter in those years and even today is not easy, becauseof the
weatherconditionsand the lack of naturalharborsalong the coast
of southernArgentina.
78. Donaldson,GeorgeCatlinIndianGallery,pp. 376-377.
79. BrianDippiegoes into detailon the matterof Catlin'sdelayed
public reactionto Schoolcraft'sbook. See Dippie, Catlinand His
Contemporaries,
pp. 319-344.
80. See CurtisM. Hinsely,Jr.,Savagesand Scientists:TheSmithsonianInstitutionand theDevelopmentof AmericanAnthropology,
1846-1910 (Washington,D.C., 1981).
81. Catlin,Liftedand SubsidedRocks,p. 225.
82. Ibid.,p. 221; and Donaldson,GeorgeCatlinIndianGallery,p.
377.
83. Catlin, Lifted and SubsidedRocks, p. 221, and Donaldson,
GeorgeCatlinIndianGallery,pp. 376-377, 777-778.
84. In this connection,it is usefulto rememberthat,in Catlin'sown
in
words, after the sour end of his career as painter-entertainer
Europe,andwhile he was consideringwhatto do, he got the ideaof
travelingto Brazilthrough"afriendof mine, a readerin theBibliothbqueImpirialeof Paris... " (Ross, GeorgeCatlin,p. 8).
85. For a discussionof criticismsto this dominantway of perceiving Indians,and to the idea of progress,see Lee ClarkMitchell,
Witnesses to a Vanishing America: The Nineteenth-Century
Response(Princeton,N.J., 1981).

39

Carlos Krebs George Catlin and SouthAmerica

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George Catlin and South America: A Look at His "Lost" Years and His Paintings of

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GEORGE CATLINAND SOUTHAMERICA:

set himself a pur-

pose in life: to become the historian of the

received his master's degree in social anthropologyfrom

with what he did or did not do in the 1850s, afterhe

TheAmericanArt Journal/VolumeXXII* Number4

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ANDFOURCHILDREN.Between 1854 and 1869. Oil onpaperboard,18 x 23 7/8".

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size of the geographicalarea involved (Fig. 3). This

A search in the Archivo Nacional of Buenos

TheAmericanArt Journal/VolumeXXII* Number4

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Fig. 3 (opposite).DrawnbyA. H. Dufour,underthedirection

vols. (Paris, 1835-1847). Collection,GeneralResearchDivision,TheNew YorkPublicLibrary,Astor;Lenoxand Tilden

wharf (Fig. 4).13

Soon after his arrival in Buenos Aires, Catlin

All this exploring activity on land and on water, in

Page left Buenos Aires for the United States on

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':L ] L :" :- : ]]]

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fact that "Thomas"-if he were Page-would have

23). An interestingpiece of news involving Indians

TheAmericanArt Journal/VolumeXXII* Number4

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bigny. CARTE D'UNE PARTIE DE LA

Fig. 5. Drawn by Parchappe (first

lection, George Peabody Library,

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. ,.:?-, i.. i.!: ?

described.The revolver incident is also interesting:

recountedby Catlin in his usual haphazardway. He

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Indiancustoms is not realized. Its overall credibility

some elaborationand will be discussed later.

TheAmericanArt Journal/VolumeXXII* Number4

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northeasternArgentina.An importantmotive behind

possible to assume that Indians from Brazil would

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are so dissimilarin appearance,dress,body ornamentation,andweaponrythata singleculturalaffiliation looks unlikely.The lip-disksCatlinplaces

TheAmericanArt Journal/VolumeXXII* Number4

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:'I::;:; . :i?:r :`:j:;:;i l : ?' I :.:....

MANWITHTWO WARRIORS. Between 1854 and 1869. Oil on paperboard, 18 3/8 x

As Anthony Seeger points out, "the ornamentation

the possibility that he was not reportingthings he

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almost secretfor so long)." It is highly probablethat

the Prince, accompanied by the Swiss artist Karl

TheAmericanArt Journal/VolumeXXII* Number4

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... ..:, . :: :.::!:,i.

fused (by the engraver) into compositions which

Fig. 13 (opposite, above). George Catlin. BOTOCUDO

paperboard, 18 1/4 x 23 1/2". Paul Mellon Collection,

Prince Maximilian,of Wied-Neuwied,Travelsin Brazil, in