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Clay Bluffs, Twenty Miles above the Mandans
From the collection of Smithsonian American Art Museum. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
“These curious bluffs must be seen as they are in nature; or else in a painting, where their colours are faithfully given, or they lose their picturesque beauty, which consists in the variety of their vivid tints. The strata of clay are alternating from red to yellow---white---brown and dark blue; and so curiously arranged, as to form the most pleasing and singular effects.” George Catlin sketched this scene in 1832, during his long voyage on the Missouri River. (Catlin, Letters and Notes, vol. 1, no. 10, 1841; reprint 1973)
Smithsonian American Art Museum’s own descriptionSubjects
Credit lineClay Bluffs, Twenty Miles above the Mandans. 1832. George Catlin, born Wilkes-Barre, PA 1796-died Jersey City, NJ 1872. Smithsonian American Art Museum, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Mrs. Joseph Harrison, Jr.. CC0.
