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CHARLES M. RUSSELL (1864–1926) Following the Buffalo Run, c. 1894
Recorded in Charles M. Russell: A Catalogue Raisonné: CR.ACM.60
Of the recurrent themes in Russell’s oeuvre, none was more thoroughly explored than the buffalo hunt. Except for a few early works in which Anglo hide hunters were portrayed in the methodical decimation of the herds, buffalo hunting for Russell was generally a grand enterprise reserved for the pre-reservation Indian. That Indian, symbolizing the Rousseauian natural man, was the single most significant symbol of the West for Russell. Such traditions as the buffalo hunt were far more profound than any of the ephemeral proficiencies of his fellow cowboys, and these traditions represented timeless and universal values that only the arts could preserve.
—Peter H. Hassrick, Charles M. Russell, Chapter III, 59
By the mid-1890s, when Charlie Russell painted Following the Buffalo Run, he was becoming steeped in the primacy of the buffalo in the Plains Indian culture. In executing the painting, he undertook the challenge of depicting Indian women accompanying their men to process the results of a successful hunt of bison. As Richard Irving Dodge explained in Our Wild Indians, his 1883 memoir about his many decades of life in the West, “When the buffalo was dead the man’s work was done. It was women’s work to skin and cut up the dead animal; and oftentimes when the men were exceptionally fortunate, the women were obliged to work hard and fast, all night long before their task was finished.” This painting amounts to a testament to C. M. Russell’s progressive and balanced artistic treatment of Native men and women in his work. In addition, this image can be viewed as a genre scene in that it captures daily aspects of Plains Indian life critical to their very survival.
This painting represents an impressive and successful outcome involving Russell’s use of the oil medium. Through a skillful progression, he was laying a sound foundation that over time would ultimately result in many of his greatest masterpieces. Many of the techniques that Russell began using during this period show up repeatedly in his works over subsequent decades. Seen to particular advantage is Russell’s use of a low angle lighting effect described by Joan Carpenter Troccoli in The Masterworks of Charles M. Russell: A Retrospective of Paintings and Sculpture. It casts the foreground in shadow so the key figure “glows in the late afternoon sunlight.” Following the Buffalo Run is one of the first examples of what both Brian Dippie and Troccoli have termed “Russell light.” In addition, Russell’s use of vibrant color in the Hudson Bay blanket and elaborate bead work draws the viewer’s attention to the central matriarchal figure laboring forward with her child on her back while managing her heavily laden travois. The accompanying rider points at some imagined action taking place ahead of them off the canvas. The colt and dog complete this family unit, and the figures trailing behind give an enhanced sense of depth to the terrain.
In sum, this particularly accomplished early work provides useful insights into Russell’s evolution as one of the outstandingly authentic Anglo-European artists of his generation in his depiction of Native American bison culture. As such, Following the Buffalo Run is a worthy precursor to In the Wake of the Buffalo Runners, which he painted seventeen years later. In the Wake of the Buffalo Runners showcases Russell’s improvements in using techniques that were evident in his early work, resulting in a masterful rendition of the Indian woman’s vital role in the buffalo hunt. As the late Peter Hassrick succinctly observed, “Russell followed a self-enlightened mandate to celebrate and preserve the Indian image as noble.”
PROVENANCE
• Will Rogers, Beverly Hills, California
• Will Rogers Jr., Bakersfield, California
• C. Bland Johnson, Los Angeles, California
• Amon G. Carter, Sr., Fort Worth, Texas
• Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas
• Private collection, Texas