George Catlin Painted Native American Tribes and Their Cultures During the 1830s

George Catlin painted almost everything he saw.  He painted pictures of unusual land that no white person had ever seen before.  He painted Native American men, women, and children.  He painted their clothes, weapons and villages. He painted the people taking part in religious ceremonies, dances and the hunting of buffalo.  He often painted three pictures in one day.

Many people criticized George Catlin.  Some said the people in his pictures did not really look as intelligent and brave as he had painted them.  They said the religious ceremonies he painted were false and that Indians did not really have ball games.  Some critics said George Catlin had invented these people.

Mister Catlin returned to the United States.  There were about five hundred paintings in his Indian Gallery.  He offered to sell them to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.  Several people worked to have the United States government buy the paintings for the Smithsonian.  However, Congress never approved a measure needed for the sale.