What Is: Ledger Art
For centuries, Native people had decorated prepared hides, including robes, clothing, shields, tipis and other items with artistic touches. Painting with quills or wooden stylus using dyes from plants were the earliest mediums. Later, as animal populations became scarce and tribes were increasingly confined to reservations, new mediums presented themselves. Instead of hides, there was paper and or fabrics available. For paint, there were water colors, chalks, and ink. From this difference in circumstances came a new type of art, known as ledger art.
A ledger is a large book in which financial or other records are kept. Traders, missionaries and military officers often had supplies of them on hand. Native artists found the paper useful for a far more decorative and perhaps psychological purpose. Painting on hides held many meanings. Calendars kept track of tribal histories. Personal paintings could commemorate success in war, or interest in the spiritual. As their world changed, Native artists came to grips with what was going on around them through their art. Pictures of buffalo hunts or battles with other tribes gave way to pictures of fights with Settlers or the Army, or new inventions such as cameras, or even trains.
Ledger art is particularly associated with one place, Fort Marion in St. Augustine, Florida. This old Spanish fortress had long been a prison for Native Americans awaiting deportation somewhere else. The Seminoles knew it firsthand in 1838. In 1874, after the Red River War, Comanche, Kiowa, Cheyenne and Arapahoe would know it, too. Later, Geronimo's Apache would also spend time here awaiting deportation first to Alabama and later to Oklahoma. The commander of Fort Marion in the 1870's, Richard Henry Pratt, offered to teach the Natives under his jurisdiction the basics of an education. They much preferred the ledgers and artistic supplies. Several Natives found later careers as artists through this medium, including David Pendleton Oakerhater of the Cheyenne and Howling Wolf, also of the Cheyenne. Some Native artists were employed by the Smithsonian. Sitting Bull, though not imprisoned at Fort Marion, also tried his hand at ledger art.
A ledger is a large book in which financial or other records are kept. Traders, missionaries and military officers often had supplies of them on hand. Native artists found the paper useful for a far more decorative and perhaps psychological purpose. Painting on hides held many meanings. Calendars kept track of tribal histories. Personal paintings could commemorate success in war, or interest in the spiritual. As their world changed, Native artists came to grips with what was going on around them through their art. Pictures of buffalo hunts or battles with other tribes gave way to pictures of fights with Settlers or the Army, or new inventions such as cameras, or even trains.
Ledger art is particularly associated with one place, Fort Marion in St. Augustine, Florida. This old Spanish fortress had long been a prison for Native Americans awaiting deportation somewhere else. The Seminoles knew it firsthand in 1838. In 1874, after the Red River War, Comanche, Kiowa, Cheyenne and Arapahoe would know it, too. Later, Geronimo's Apache would also spend time here awaiting deportation first to Alabama and later to Oklahoma. The commander of Fort Marion in the 1870's, Richard Henry Pratt, offered to teach the Natives under his jurisdiction the basics of an education. They much preferred the ledgers and artistic supplies. Several Natives found later careers as artists through this medium, including David Pendleton Oakerhater of the Cheyenne and Howling Wolf, also of the Cheyenne. Some Native artists were employed by the Smithsonian. Sitting Bull, though not imprisoned at Fort Marion, also tried his hand at ledger art.
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