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The Tower, 1100 Miles above St. Louis
From the collection of Smithsonian American Art Museum. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
George Catlin described this scene as “a high and remarkable clay bluff, rising to the height of some hundreds of feet from the water, and having in distance, the castellated appearance of a fortification.” He painted this image in 1832 while on a lengthy voyage northwest on the Missouri River. Every bluff on the Upper Missouri reminded Catlin, a true student of the picturesque, of a castle, turret, or tower. (Catlin, Letters and Notes, vol. 2, no. 32, 1841, reprint 1973; Truettner, The Natural Man Observed, 1979)
Smithsonian American Art Museum’s own descriptionSubjects
Credit lineThe Tower, 1100 Miles above St. Louis. 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.
