CC0 · no rights reserved
Old Arrow Maker
From the collection of Smithsonian American Art Museum. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
Old Arrow Maker depicts a scene from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's epic poem The Song of Hiawatha (1855). This poem relies on romanticized tropes about Native peoples' lifeways as incompatible with modern life. Edmonia Lewis, an Afro-Indigenous artist who was raised by her Mississauga maternal aunts, capitalized on the broad appeal of Longfellow's poem. Longfellow was an abolitionist, and his work was popular among the same people who were Lewis's primary patrons.
Smithsonian American Art Museum’s own descriptionSubjects
Credit lineOld Arrow Maker. modeled 1866. Edmonia Lewis, born Greenbush (now Rensselaer), NY 1844-died London, England 1907. Smithsonian American Art Museum, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Norman Robbins. CC0.
