Rosa Bonheur, a 19th century French painter and sculptor most well-known for her highly detailed depictions of animals, never visited the American West. But Whitney Western Art Museum Assistant Curator Ashlea Espinal says she developed a fascination with the place through interacting with American artists and her friendship with William F. Cody.
When Cody’s Wild West show came to Paris, Espinal said he gave her free reign to wander the show grounds and speak with the performers.
“She spent hours observing the performers and the animals of the show. Of her visits she wrote, ‘I was able to examine their tents at my ease. I was present at family scenes. I conversed as best as I could with warriors and their wives and children. I made studies of the bison, horses and arms,’” she said.
Espinal says one of her paintings features two Oglala Lakota chiefs: Rocky Bear and Red Shirt. Bonheur got to know them when they traveled to Paris with the show in 1889.
“But they were both also important figures amongst the Oglala before they became performers. They were leaders, warriors and statesmen among the Oglala Lakota,” she said.
Espinal said both men were part of diplomatic trips to Washington, D.C. with the Oglala Lakota political leader, Red Cloud. He spoke out against the harsh treatment of Native American people by the government and unfair treaties.
Espinal said Bonheur went on to create more than 50 paintings and sketches that were inspired by the Wild West show.
“Even after the show left Paris she continued to talk about it and write about it, and it also continued to have an influence on her artwork, with some of her later sketches and paintings depicting Native peoples, American bison and American mustangs,” she said.
Three of Bonheur’s paintings, including the one of Rocky Bear and Red Shirt, that are part of the Whitney Western Art Museum’s collection were recently featured in a retrospective of the artist's work at the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux and the Musée d'Orsay.
