George Catlin's Indian Gallery

On view are 287 portraits, landscapes, and scenes of American Indian life by George Catlin. A lawyer turned painter, Catlin (1796-1872) traveled thousands of miles from 1830 to 1836 following parts of the trail of the Lewis and Clark expedition to record the "manners and customs" of Native Americans. He visited 50 tribes living west of the Mississippi River from present-day North Dakota to Oklahoma.

Also on view are 3 Thomas Moran paintings—2 date from 1872 and are on long-term loan from the U.S. Dept. of the Interior, and a 3rd from 1893 that is part of the museum's permanent collection. The exhibition recalls Catlin's installation of his Indian Gallery as he displayed it during his tours of Europe in the 1840s, with works hung salon-style, one-atop-another and side-by-side.