American Art Collaborative

“Amongst the women of this tribe, there were many that were exceedingly pretty in feature and in form; and also in expression, though their skins are very dark . . . [They] are always decently and comfortably clad, being covered generally with a gown or slip, that reaches from the chin quite down to the ankles, made of deer or elk skins . . . I have given the portraits of . . . [Thighs and Wild Sage], the two . . . women who had been held as prisoners by the Osages, and purchased by the Indian Commissioner, the Reverend Mr. Schemmerhom, and brought home to their own people.” Catlin probably painted this portrait at Fort Gibson (in present-day Oklahoma) in 1834. (Catlin, Letters and Notes, vol. 2, no. 43, 1841, reprint 1973; Truettner, The Natural Man Observed, 1979)