Post by grahamew on Jun 10, 2008 13:26:25 GMT -5
My reviw first appeared in The English Westerners' Tally Sheet
Frank H. Goodyear III, Red Cloud: Photographs of an Oglala Chief (Lincoln; University of Nebraska Press, 2003); 211 pages, including illustrations, notes and bibliography. ISBN 0-8032-2192-4 Hardcover - $35.00
In the late 1960s, the American Indian Movement created a number of posters of Indian leaders; one of these was Red Cloud, using the well-known Charles M. Bell photograph taken in 1880, in which the subject sits in a hair-fringed shirt, wearing a feather in his unbraided, long hair. This is one of the most frequently reproduced depictions of the Oglala leader, doubtless because it seems to show him in his ‘native’ splendour, but, as Frank H. Goodyear notes, out of the many photographs taken of Red Cloud, this is one of the most faux. The shirt he wears features in photographs of other Lakota leaders taken at the same time (Touch the Clouds, Little Wound and American Horse) and underneath he wears trousers and even shoes, which Bell has tried to conceal under fake grass to perpetuate the feeling that Red Cloud was still ‘wild’.
This book is full of such insights into the portrayals of Red Cloud, of which the author located 128 different photographs during his research. Most of them are reproduced here, in chronological order; those that are not are variants on those that are, or pictures about which Goodyear was unable to find much information.
However, this is not just a ‘life in pictures’. It is the author’s argument that Red Cloud used photography as a subtle way of dealing with the political issues that concerned him, issues both between the US government and his people, and those that affected his status within the Oglala. To do this, Goodyear, drawing on semiotics, has ‘read’ the photographs closely, looking for evidence to support his theories. Sometimes, there is documentation which would seem to back up the notion that Red Cloud was photographed, to the best of his ability, on his own terms, even while the photographer was often constructing ‘Red Cloud’ the way the dominant white society expected – hence the war shirt and feather in the Bell photograph, although I suspect his everyday wear back on the reservation did not comprise of a suit and patent leather shoes either.
Does the theory hold up? There are certainly instances when Goodyear has found written accounts to support his ideas. It is known, for example, that Red Cloud was asked to pose by Matthew Brady when he visited New York in 1870, but he declined because ‘he was not dressed for the occasion’. Goodyear sees his willingness to sit for Brady two years later – in a chair ‘Brady reserved for presidents, senators, and other high-ranking officials’ – as a sign that he wished to work with American authorities towards a diplomatic solution to the problems facing the Oglalas.
That Red Cloud was only too aware of his appearance and other people’s perception of him is shown in the series of pictures taken by Alexander Gardner in 1872. When photographed with William Blackmore, a wealthy Englishman with a great interest in Indians, Red Cloud is wearing a dark formal jacket and gloves, has unbraided his hair and removed the feather he wore for his first sitting with Gardner. That he chose to be photographed in apparel similar to Blackmore’s and is seen shaking his hands (though not returning his gaze), seems to indicate his respect for the Englishman.
After the early 1880s, Red Cloud undergoes a severe image change, preferring to be photographed in suits and with his hair cut short. The resulting images can be read as symbolic of appeasement, but while Red Cloud had long given up the armed resistance of Sitting Bull, he was no appeaser but someone who understood the need for diplomatic resistance. Goodyear theorises that the public image Red Cloud adopted – frequently that of ‘a distinguished white man’ – was to make him look more like the people he was dealing with, to show he wanted to be taken seriously and on equal terms by the US government and various white friends in the East and the West, during a period of increased turbulence on the reservation, where factionalism was rife following the troubles of the 1870s and where he was frequently in conflict with the Agent, Valentine McGillycuddy.
Sometimes, there is the feeling that Goodyear’s reliance on semiotics goes a little too far. One photograph of Red Cloud taken in 1885 by Frank and Orville Johnson in Washington shows the Oglala wearing a suit, but holding a hat over a fake rock. Goodyear suggests he ‘may have positioned his hat this way on purpose; given the “primitive” associations surrounding such a studio prop, he was perhaps uncomfortable next to it.’ Maybe.
Part of the problem with this type of reading is that, academically fascinating though it may be, there is not always evidence to back up the writer’s contentions and historians reading this text might be less inclined to welcome such open speculation than art historians. Goodyear sees Red Cloud as forcefully interacting with the camera, allowing himself to be photographed the way he wanted, but there are pictures in which he is clearly seen exactly like the dominant culture wished him to be seen. Two portraits by John Nephew in 1889 show Red Cloud from the front and in profile, indicating, as the author admits, that the photographer saw him ‘a subject of scientific study’, despite the Oglala projecting a certain gravitas that would be proper for a diplomatic visit to Washington. This type of view was not unusual. Red Cloud was shot a number of times like this; indeed the Charles Bell session that produced the famous seated portrait in 1880 also yielded up scientific-style front and profile portraits.
Another problem with the author’s approach is that readings other than his are possible. Nephew made two portraits of Red Cloud with his white friend, Charles P. Jordan. Goodyear notes that Red Cloud’s stylish dress, at a time when less than a third of all Lakotas had adopted white man’s clothes, shows that he was ‘experimenting with the idea of being part of … [white] culture.’ The two photographs, however, show Jordan standing over a seated Red Cloud; in both, he rests his arm on Red Cloud’s shoulder, suggesting to potential owners of the picture, an image of white dominance over the Indian – even though this would not have been Jordan’s intention.
Red Cloud let his hair grow from 1889 onwards and was never again photographed with it short. Goodyear contends that this indicated his ‘disillusionment with non-Native officials and his growing desire to re-engage with traditional Oglala customs’, but this is not to suggest that the photographs portraying him in traditional clothing (whether cloth or buckskin) necessarily represent political statements on his part. That he chose to allow himself to be photographed this way might well symbolise his disenchantment with the political dialogue he had (and continued to have) with government officials, but several pictures made from this time up until his death in 1909 are representative of the photographer wanting to cash in on the popular idea of what constituted an Indian.
Native apparel had not been worn commonly (except for ceremonial occasions) since the late 1870s-early1880s and these photographs did not reflect the worsening social and economic conditions on the reservation, but public interest for this sort of image had been stimulated by press coverage of the Ghost Dance and Wounded Knee and the popularity of Wild West Shows. In 1893, William F. Cody had asked Red Cloud to join his show and had even commissioned a poster showing him in his younger days, but the Oglala turned down his offer of $150 per day plus expenses. However, he did agree to pose in traditional garb with Buffalo Bill and American Horse for some publicity portraits for the show at Madison Square Garden in 1897. David Barry’s photographs for this session reveal that Cody is sitting on a far larger horse than Red Cloud, thus appearing more imposing, an illusion emphasised in some of the shots where the Oglala’s status appears weakened because of the dark goggles he wears.
A portrait from the same shoot shows a soft-focused, romanticised Red Cloud in a war bonnet and without the dark goggles he had worn (to protect his failing eyesight) in some of the other pictures. Goodyear’s reading puts this photograph in a wider social context, positing that this ‘image represents the Oglala chief as a heroic figure from another era’: not only did this cultural construction reflects the construct of a western history which legitimised the taking of Indian lands, but the possession of such a photograph would allow the owner to vicariously participate in a ‘simpler’ past during a period when the country was undergoing ‘fin-de-siecle crises in American masculinity and immigration policy.’
The final photograph Goodyear reproduces is a family portrait taken in 1909, not long before Red Cloud’s death at the age of 88, featuring him, his son, Jack, and daughter-in-law, Nancy. The latter wears the dress of a white woman; Jack is dressed like a white man, though he retains his braids and moccasins; but Red Cloud’s defiance is there to the end: he has an eagle feather in his long hair and wears a dark stroud blanket with beaded strip, beaded cloth leggings and quilled moccasins.
While it may not be easy to agree with all of Goodyear’s conclusions about each individual photograph, it becomes clear that Red Cloud was not always a passive subject and he sought to use the art form as something of a diplomatic tool in his relationship with white officials and even other Lakota. For instance, a John Grabill 1891 full length portrait of Red Cloud shaking hands with the more ‘progressive’ American Horse represents a rapprochement after years of political feuding, although the former’s retention of Indian garb as opposed to the latter’s hat, coat and gun belt, highlights the differences that remained between the two.
Goodyear has contextualised his ideas and the photographs within the life of Red Cloud and his relationships with the U.S. government and Lakota society, drawing on much first hand evidence to lend credence to his readings. The result is an absorbing work that helps to challenge preconceived notions about Indians before the camera, indicating that their ‘willingness to participate in the ritual of photography’ can be seen not as an example of pandering to the dominant culture, but of ‘appropriating a non-Native technology to respond to new circumstances.’
Frank H. Goodyear III, Red Cloud: Photographs of an Oglala Chief (Lincoln; University of Nebraska Press, 2003); 211 pages, including illustrations, notes and bibliography. ISBN 0-8032-2192-4 Hardcover - $35.00
In the late 1960s, the American Indian Movement created a number of posters of Indian leaders; one of these was Red Cloud, using the well-known Charles M. Bell photograph taken in 1880, in which the subject sits in a hair-fringed shirt, wearing a feather in his unbraided, long hair. This is one of the most frequently reproduced depictions of the Oglala leader, doubtless because it seems to show him in his ‘native’ splendour, but, as Frank H. Goodyear notes, out of the many photographs taken of Red Cloud, this is one of the most faux. The shirt he wears features in photographs of other Lakota leaders taken at the same time (Touch the Clouds, Little Wound and American Horse) and underneath he wears trousers and even shoes, which Bell has tried to conceal under fake grass to perpetuate the feeling that Red Cloud was still ‘wild’.
This book is full of such insights into the portrayals of Red Cloud, of which the author located 128 different photographs during his research. Most of them are reproduced here, in chronological order; those that are not are variants on those that are, or pictures about which Goodyear was unable to find much information.
However, this is not just a ‘life in pictures’. It is the author’s argument that Red Cloud used photography as a subtle way of dealing with the political issues that concerned him, issues both between the US government and his people, and those that affected his status within the Oglala. To do this, Goodyear, drawing on semiotics, has ‘read’ the photographs closely, looking for evidence to support his theories. Sometimes, there is documentation which would seem to back up the notion that Red Cloud was photographed, to the best of his ability, on his own terms, even while the photographer was often constructing ‘Red Cloud’ the way the dominant white society expected – hence the war shirt and feather in the Bell photograph, although I suspect his everyday wear back on the reservation did not comprise of a suit and patent leather shoes either.
Does the theory hold up? There are certainly instances when Goodyear has found written accounts to support his ideas. It is known, for example, that Red Cloud was asked to pose by Matthew Brady when he visited New York in 1870, but he declined because ‘he was not dressed for the occasion’. Goodyear sees his willingness to sit for Brady two years later – in a chair ‘Brady reserved for presidents, senators, and other high-ranking officials’ – as a sign that he wished to work with American authorities towards a diplomatic solution to the problems facing the Oglalas.
That Red Cloud was only too aware of his appearance and other people’s perception of him is shown in the series of pictures taken by Alexander Gardner in 1872. When photographed with William Blackmore, a wealthy Englishman with a great interest in Indians, Red Cloud is wearing a dark formal jacket and gloves, has unbraided his hair and removed the feather he wore for his first sitting with Gardner. That he chose to be photographed in apparel similar to Blackmore’s and is seen shaking his hands (though not returning his gaze), seems to indicate his respect for the Englishman.
After the early 1880s, Red Cloud undergoes a severe image change, preferring to be photographed in suits and with his hair cut short. The resulting images can be read as symbolic of appeasement, but while Red Cloud had long given up the armed resistance of Sitting Bull, he was no appeaser but someone who understood the need for diplomatic resistance. Goodyear theorises that the public image Red Cloud adopted – frequently that of ‘a distinguished white man’ – was to make him look more like the people he was dealing with, to show he wanted to be taken seriously and on equal terms by the US government and various white friends in the East and the West, during a period of increased turbulence on the reservation, where factionalism was rife following the troubles of the 1870s and where he was frequently in conflict with the Agent, Valentine McGillycuddy.
Sometimes, there is the feeling that Goodyear’s reliance on semiotics goes a little too far. One photograph of Red Cloud taken in 1885 by Frank and Orville Johnson in Washington shows the Oglala wearing a suit, but holding a hat over a fake rock. Goodyear suggests he ‘may have positioned his hat this way on purpose; given the “primitive” associations surrounding such a studio prop, he was perhaps uncomfortable next to it.’ Maybe.
Part of the problem with this type of reading is that, academically fascinating though it may be, there is not always evidence to back up the writer’s contentions and historians reading this text might be less inclined to welcome such open speculation than art historians. Goodyear sees Red Cloud as forcefully interacting with the camera, allowing himself to be photographed the way he wanted, but there are pictures in which he is clearly seen exactly like the dominant culture wished him to be seen. Two portraits by John Nephew in 1889 show Red Cloud from the front and in profile, indicating, as the author admits, that the photographer saw him ‘a subject of scientific study’, despite the Oglala projecting a certain gravitas that would be proper for a diplomatic visit to Washington. This type of view was not unusual. Red Cloud was shot a number of times like this; indeed the Charles Bell session that produced the famous seated portrait in 1880 also yielded up scientific-style front and profile portraits.
Another problem with the author’s approach is that readings other than his are possible. Nephew made two portraits of Red Cloud with his white friend, Charles P. Jordan. Goodyear notes that Red Cloud’s stylish dress, at a time when less than a third of all Lakotas had adopted white man’s clothes, shows that he was ‘experimenting with the idea of being part of … [white] culture.’ The two photographs, however, show Jordan standing over a seated Red Cloud; in both, he rests his arm on Red Cloud’s shoulder, suggesting to potential owners of the picture, an image of white dominance over the Indian – even though this would not have been Jordan’s intention.
Red Cloud let his hair grow from 1889 onwards and was never again photographed with it short. Goodyear contends that this indicated his ‘disillusionment with non-Native officials and his growing desire to re-engage with traditional Oglala customs’, but this is not to suggest that the photographs portraying him in traditional clothing (whether cloth or buckskin) necessarily represent political statements on his part. That he chose to allow himself to be photographed this way might well symbolise his disenchantment with the political dialogue he had (and continued to have) with government officials, but several pictures made from this time up until his death in 1909 are representative of the photographer wanting to cash in on the popular idea of what constituted an Indian.
Native apparel had not been worn commonly (except for ceremonial occasions) since the late 1870s-early1880s and these photographs did not reflect the worsening social and economic conditions on the reservation, but public interest for this sort of image had been stimulated by press coverage of the Ghost Dance and Wounded Knee and the popularity of Wild West Shows. In 1893, William F. Cody had asked Red Cloud to join his show and had even commissioned a poster showing him in his younger days, but the Oglala turned down his offer of $150 per day plus expenses. However, he did agree to pose in traditional garb with Buffalo Bill and American Horse for some publicity portraits for the show at Madison Square Garden in 1897. David Barry’s photographs for this session reveal that Cody is sitting on a far larger horse than Red Cloud, thus appearing more imposing, an illusion emphasised in some of the shots where the Oglala’s status appears weakened because of the dark goggles he wears.
A portrait from the same shoot shows a soft-focused, romanticised Red Cloud in a war bonnet and without the dark goggles he had worn (to protect his failing eyesight) in some of the other pictures. Goodyear’s reading puts this photograph in a wider social context, positing that this ‘image represents the Oglala chief as a heroic figure from another era’: not only did this cultural construction reflects the construct of a western history which legitimised the taking of Indian lands, but the possession of such a photograph would allow the owner to vicariously participate in a ‘simpler’ past during a period when the country was undergoing ‘fin-de-siecle crises in American masculinity and immigration policy.’
The final photograph Goodyear reproduces is a family portrait taken in 1909, not long before Red Cloud’s death at the age of 88, featuring him, his son, Jack, and daughter-in-law, Nancy. The latter wears the dress of a white woman; Jack is dressed like a white man, though he retains his braids and moccasins; but Red Cloud’s defiance is there to the end: he has an eagle feather in his long hair and wears a dark stroud blanket with beaded strip, beaded cloth leggings and quilled moccasins.
While it may not be easy to agree with all of Goodyear’s conclusions about each individual photograph, it becomes clear that Red Cloud was not always a passive subject and he sought to use the art form as something of a diplomatic tool in his relationship with white officials and even other Lakota. For instance, a John Grabill 1891 full length portrait of Red Cloud shaking hands with the more ‘progressive’ American Horse represents a rapprochement after years of political feuding, although the former’s retention of Indian garb as opposed to the latter’s hat, coat and gun belt, highlights the differences that remained between the two.
Goodyear has contextualised his ideas and the photographs within the life of Red Cloud and his relationships with the U.S. government and Lakota society, drawing on much first hand evidence to lend credence to his readings. The result is an absorbing work that helps to challenge preconceived notions about Indians before the camera, indicating that their ‘willingness to participate in the ritual of photography’ can be seen not as an example of pandering to the dominant culture, but of ‘appropriating a non-Native technology to respond to new circumstances.’