Sioux Indian Painting, Partial Volumes I and II [SOLD]

The French publisher, C. Szwedzicki, issued a series of six art portfolios between 1929 and 1952 (this set is 1938) on Native American art, edited by American scholars Oscar Burr Jacobson, Kenneth Milton Chapman, and Hartley Alexander.  To the credit of the publisher, the portfolios were printed in the expensive combination of collotype and pochoir, a process that took weeks to complete.

One of the six portfolios was entitled Sioux Indian Painting Part I Painting of the Sioux and Other Tribes of the Great Plains with Introduction and Notes by Hartley Burr Alexander.  It was published in 1938 in an edition of 400 copies, each containing 25 plates of art.  The second portfolio was entitled Sioux Indian Painting Part II The Art of Amos Bad Heart Buffalo with Introduction and Notes by Hartley Burr Alexander. It too was published in 1938, also in an edition of 400 copies and with 25 plates of art. 

Volume I contains a 15-page letterpress introduction in both French and English and 25 leaves of plates contained in a hard cover portfolio measuring 19-3/8” x 16” with string ties and a color plate on the front cover.  Artworks of a number of Sioux, Shoshone, and Kiowa artists (Kills Two, Amos Bad Heart Buffalo, Pretty Hawk, Chief Washakie, and Silver Horn) are included.

Volume II contains a 10-page letterpress introduction in both French and English and 25 leaves of plates devoted to the Battle of the Little Big Horn and Wounded Knee Massacre, all pictographic art renderings by Amos Bad Heart Buffalo, an Oglala Sioux, who was only age 6 at the time of the battle, but who became the tribal historian. Seventeen of the twenty-five plates in this volume relate entirely to the Custer battle, and the others to the Wounded Knee massacre.  His documentation of the battle is among the few visual records, all of which were left by Indians.

The contents of our offering of these drawings is incomplete and limited only to the following listings.  The entire group (14 images) is being offered as a complete set, not individually. 

Volume I.  Drawing of a “Mounted Sioux Sabering a Pawnee Bowman” by Kills Two (1869-1927) Oglala Sioux, 1938, Pochoir print.  Measures 12” x 16” paper size.  Not framed or shrink-wrapped.

Volume I. Drawing of a “Sioux Warrior Armed with Saber Attacking a Crow Indian” by Kills Two (1869-1927) Oglala Sioux, 1938, Pochoir print. Measures 12” x 16” paper size. Not framed or shrink-wrapped.

Volume I. Drawing of “The Celebrated Sioux Chieftain Afraid-of-his-Horses Attacking a Crow Indian” by Kills Two (1869-1927) Oglala Sioux, 1938, Pochoir print. Measures 12” x 16” paper size. Not framed or shrink-wrapped.

Volume II. The 10-page letterpress introduction of the portfolio, the hardback portfolio folder, and the following plates (all of which are shrink-wrapped):

I-XIII (These first 13 plates are missing)

XIV: The End of the Battle by Amos Bad Heart Buffalo

XV: Warriors Retiring from the Battlefield Leading Captured Horses

XVI: General Custer’s Troopers Dismounted Receiving the Attack

XVII: (This plate is missing)

XVIII: The Death of Crazy Horse

XIX: Battle Scene

XX:  The Give-away Celebration

XXI: Scalp Dance or Victory Dance

XXII: Smoothing the Place Dance

XXIII: Ceremony sequent to that shown in Plate XXII

XXIV: Ceremony sequent to that shown in Plate XXII

XXV: Amos Bad Heart Buffalo representing himself as a Cowboy

This grouping of some of the plates from Volume I and some from Volume II are all in good condition and suitable for framing.  None is currently framed although some are shrink-wrapped.  This Sioux set of pictographic pochoir prints is rather rare as many sets have been broken up for framing and a number of sets were destroyed in France during World War II.  Complete sets are extremely rare.