Indian Women Moving Camp 1896

Charles M. Russell made this painting, Indian Women Moving Camp, with watercolor and gouache on paper. These traditional art materials – pigments bound and suspended in a water-based medium – are a far cry from the lives of his subjects. Russell idealizes a nomadic existence dependent on horses, dogs, and human labor to move teepees and supplies. In the painting, there is an emphasis on the traditional roles of women in the community, their role in the relocation of their camps. The artist likely had little direct experience of this way of life, though it served as a potent symbol of the American West in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when this image was made. Russell romanticized the scene with his chosen materials, while obscuring the complex politics and economies that made such traditional practices increasingly unsustainable. In recognizing the distinction between reality and representation, we are compelled to expand our understanding of fine art and its relationship to broader histories of creative practices.