Edward S. Curtis and the “Curtis Indian”

1. Edward S. Curtis and the “Curtis Indian” COMS 220 7 March 2013 P.H. (Trish) Audette-Longo Photo credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_S._Curtis

2. Guiding questions • In his article, Gunning (2009) writes, recording via film could transform "social relations of power and observation" while at the same time it was a product of these very relations (47). How can we unpack this tension by focusing on a colonial discourse running through the archiving/documenting efforts of early photography? • How do imaginaries, or representations of the past, linger today? Why do they matter?

3. “Other”-ing • Stuart Hall (1997) argues exerting power isn’t an act limited to “economic exploitation and physical coercion” but exercising “symbolic power through representational practices” (259). • “a discourse produces, through different practices of representation(scholarship, exhibition, literature, painting, etc.), a form of racialized knowledgeof the Other... deeply implicated in the operations of power (imperialism)” (260).

5. Edward S. Curtis • Born 1868 in Wisconsin; at 12 years old, he used a photography manual and a lens to build his own first camera; by the late 1880s he was in Seattle and, a few years later, opened a portrait studio (Touchie 2010: 19-21) • In 1900, he headed west to "record images of Indians," (Valaskakis 2005: 128). His journeys and work spanned three decades, thousands of prints, and to this day captures a collective imagination. • http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20351012

6. Motivation “The passing of every old man or woman means the passing of some tradition, some knowledge of sacred rights possessed by no other. Consequently, the information that is to be gathered for the benefit of future generations must be collected at once or the opportunity will be lost for all time.” -- Curtis, quoted in Makepeace (2000)

7. What is left out? “A lot of the photographs, they showed traditional people in their traditional garb. They’re depicting a side of us that goes back thousands of years, but they weren’t showing what Indian agents and governments and everybody else were doing to our people at the same time. The state that Indian communities were in was really terrible.” -- Jerry Potts, Piegan tribe, quoted in Makepeace (2000)

8. Why does it matter? • What are the political repercussions of such archiving/fantasizing? • “Collecting – customs and clothes; images, memories, and idioms; spoons, songs, and spirits – removes or redefines the lived significations of identity and power that are enacted and acted upon in Indian experience” (Valaskakis 2005: 72).

9. References • Francis, D. (2011 [1992]) The Imaginary Indian: The Image of the Indian in Canadian Culture. Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press. • Gunning, T. (2009). The detective camera and the documentary impulse. Collecting Visible Evidence (46-64), J. Gaines and M. Renov (Eds.). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. • Hall, S. (1997). The spectacle of the other, in S. Hall (Ed.) Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices (223-290).Thousand Oaks CA: Sage Publications. • Lyman, C. (1982) The Vanishing Race and Other Illusions: Photographs of Indians by Edward S. Curtis. New York: Pantheon Books. • Makepeace, A. (2000). [Film]. Coming to Light: Edward S. Curtis and the North American Indians. Bullfrog Films. • Touchie, R. (2010). Edward S. Curtis: Above the Medicine Line. Vancouver: Heritage House Publishing Company Ltd. • Valaskakis, G. (2005). Indian Country: Essays on Contemporary Native Culture. Waterloo, Ont.: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.