60 Rare Authentic Native American Photos You Must See Before You Die

[Tin Can]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PI6nGejDhZk

circa 1900

[Two23]

I've very disappointed they didn't list the photographers.


Kent in SD

[r.e.]

I've very disappointed they didn't list the photographers.


Kent in SD

There are good sources for late 1800s/early 1900s photographs of aboriginal peoples, but this isn't one of them. Complete waste of time.

[darr]

Some are by Edward Curtis.
I have a print of what the narrator called, "Navajo Boy" is actually titled, "Son of the Desert".
There are a few nice books of Edward Curtis' work that are reasonably priced and much better reproductions than the video.

[Tin Can]

So experts

Lead

[Mark Sampson]

I'd look up the work of Adam Clark Vroman. There are at least two books of his fine photographs, one published by Aperture.
There is a whole industry around the photographs of Edward Sheriff Curtis (my wife is a scholar of his photogravures) so many books are available. I'll look in our home library and find a good one to recommend.
"Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher" is an excellent biography of Curtis, detailing his obsession, heroic work, and tragic end.

[Tin Can]

Not a waste of my time.

A conversation resulted with better source.

There are good sources for late 1800s/early 1900s photographs of aboriginal peoples, but this isn't one of them. Complete waste of time.

[Drew Wiley]

Besides being unable to pronounce alleged tribal names even remotely correctly, there can be little doubt quite a few of those shots were staged on reservations with inauthentic costume. Edward S. Curtis was infamous for toting around stereotypical Indian costumes and putting them on individuals in completely different areas. His work could be artistically impressive, while at the same time, ethnographically bogus. Might as well watch a John Wayne movie. Call that U tube flick interesting if you want, but there isn't much "authentic" or even learned about it.

Heck - even the grandchildren of Indians I grew up with dress up fancy like Iroquois warriors and Sioux chieftains so the casino goers can get some "authentic Indian" dance entertainment, whereas the true aboriginal dress in that area was close to zero. And at this point in time, not many would fare very well in a DNA test either concerning authenticity.

[Willie]

You guys.
Why not get right in with the Indians with a job at a PowWow.

https://uttc.edu/2022/08/03/temporar...022-at-500-pm/

[Drew Wiley]

Yeah, pow wows. Most of them seem to be synonymous with "Generic Indians Welcome; please watch a few John Wayne Movies first". Right across the deep river canyon from my place, a couple of my old high school buddies and running partners, both full-blooded local tribe members, have been attempting to keep some authentic culture alive by founding a school teaching the local dialect, and through interviews with the few remaining elderly persons who, while they were still alive, remembered a bit of pre-white times, including a lot of native plant knowledge. I commend that; and it's something I've done myself decades ago, when it was still possible.

But pulling directly the opposite direction, right down the creek, there was a colony of wannabees, or what I term Hippie Indians, doing all the make-believe nonsense. An authentic local basket by one of my mother's friends might easily sell for ten or twenty thousand dollars to a serious collector. The Smithsonian collected quite a few. Many of these are so tightly woven that they're watertight without any use of pitch. The mafia even raided the little neighborhood museum, and sold the baskets on the black market. But the baskets the Hippie Indians weave look like they were purchased for $1.99 apiece at some shopping mall craft store.