open dyslexic mode

Elbridge Ayer Burbank’s depictions of Native Americans are among his most famous paintings. After the surrender of Geronimo, during a time when the idea of “Kill the Indian, Save the Human” was beginning to take hold in the American political landscape, Burbank became concerned with portraying as many Native Americans as possible, as he considered their very survival to be threatened.

Burbank was called “Son of the Shadow-Maker” by Chief Blue Horse, who rode to Burbank’s studio each day to pose for him.

As much as I praise Burbank in this video, I also wish to present some counterarguments against his work.

There are issues that people have raised regarding his depictions of Native Americans. He was, after all, a white man in the late 19th and early 20th centuries portraying a people he was not part of, whose perception was partially shaped by broader society’s notions.

For most of his sitters, he had them dress in traditional costumes, wield weapons, and wear war paint, despite the fact that many were fully assimilated into the modern world.

Critics argue that he did not actually capture Indigenous people as they truly were, but instead reinforced colonial constructions of “the Indian” as a vanishing, racialized type.