Smithsonian American Art Museum
Clay Bluffs, Twenty Miles above the Mandans
George Catlin, born Wilkes-Barre, PA 1796-died Jersey City, NJ 1872 · 1832
“These curious bluffs must be seen as they are in nature; or else in a painting, where their colours are faithfully given, or they lose their picturesque beauty, which consists in the variety of their vivid tints. The strata of clay are alternating from red to yellow---white---brown and dark blue; and so curiously arranged, as to form the most pleasing and singular effects.” George Catlin sketched this scene in 1832, during his long voyage on the Missouri River. (Catlin, Letters and Notes, vol. 1, no. 10, 1841; reprint 1973)
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