Smithsonian American Art Museum
No-wáy-ke-súg-gah, He Who Strikes Two at Once, a Brave
George Catlin, born Wilkes-Barre, PA 1796-died Jersey City, NJ 1872 · 1832
George Catlin described this portrait as a “sketch quite unfinished; beautiful dress, trimmed with a profusion of scalp-locks and eagles' quills; pipe in his hand, and necklace of grisly bears' claws.” The degree of finish in this portrait perhaps represents what Catlin hoped to achieve in the single sitting he normally allowed his Indian subjects. The artist probably painted No-wáy-ke-súg-gah at Fort Leavenworth (in today’s Kansas) in 1832. (Catlin, 1848 Catalogue, Catlin’s Indian Gallery, SAAM online exhibition; Truettner, The Natural Man Observed, 1979)
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