QE. Deming, His Work Edwin Willard Deming Foreword by Professor Henry Fairfield Osborn Compiled by Therese O. Deming Edited by Henry Collins Walsh Epwin Witiarp Deminc Indian Mysticism Beginning with the pioneer brush of George Catlin in the wild west of the years 1832-40, America has produced a series of painters and sculptors who have been inspired by the romance, the daring, and the picturesque in Indian life. In this notable list are the names of Karl Bodmer, Seth East- man, Baldwin Mollhausen, Paul Kane, Rudolf Fredrich Kurz, Clark Wimar, and Edwin Willard Deming. Despite the encroachment of civilization, our Indians have been as tenacious of their rights, their customs, their ceremonials, and their dress, in war and peace, as all their great Mongoloid relatives across the Pacific. Through the courage, determi- nation and artistic skill of our artists much has been pre- served of the pre-Columbian history of America. It is fortu- nate in our practical, mechanical age that there survive such idealists, to whom artistic and realistic expression means far more than commercial or practical achievement. In the future, when the work of all these artists are im- partially evaluated, Edwin Willard Deming will be looked upon as having superior insight and as being a master in portraying Indian mysticism. In our many meetings and conversations I have always been impressed with his deep sympathy for the mystical and supernatural side of the Indian life and his admiration for the many fine character- istics of this great and fast vanishing race. Only through ‘sympathy and insight can the artist portray more than a superficial aspect of his subject. Deming gives us far more than a model; he penetrates the deep reserve of Indian stoicism and finds there an underlying reverence and awe in the presence of the great founder of nature, and flashes of the underlying human spirit of sentiment and_ tenderness. Deming was predisposed to his subject, and unchecked by art conventions, without opportunity of finding in the Art Schools the necessary technique, he has developed his own technique, his own point of view, his own impressions. Thus he gives his subjects original treatment, both in the handling 3 ‘ % of color and of light and shade and in the portrayal of the expressions of the deeper emotions which the Indian is habitually desirous of concealing. In the ceremonial visits, in the dances, in the funerals or mournings for the dead, we have more than mere photographic portrayals—we have a really penetrating vision of Indian life. This little volume contains a short sketch of Deming’s life, a list of his best known paintings, with photographs and annotations by his ever helpful and encouraging wife, and letters of appreciation from artists and historians and from the always appreciative Theodore Roosevelt. May this booklet go forth on its friendly mission, but may it not, fora moment, mark the cessation of Edwin Willard Deming’s creative work. Henry FarrFIELD OsBorn. New York, February 18, 1925. With many thanks and kind appre- ciation to all who have contributed to this little booklet. FeO, Deming,.1925 Saganoe HCl LIEALIG eee VU, DQemreng te | EID oY Aan, Zit ahs Arg Arn A wrtuta., of Loo Cegt yd ka — Auet yen ae Cry ele Llren aAn~€ hvrtad bain he lt Be< ( un—€ ttev0 Lo mone a Tf. as en be—s~—, PRIS Lasse ae pol — of. F LO ole — dita A ee de Murat Decoration Painted for Mrs. E. H. Harriman. My Dear Deminc: Saw your Harriman decoration at Macbeth’s. They area credit to you and to American art. You are getting so you can better express your very elusive material. Yours, FREDERIC REMINGTON. Ridgefield, Ct., February, 1gto. Murat Decoration Painted for Mrs. E. H. Harriman. ‘unasny] ULIpPUy UvoaUTY sy Aq pauMO V1-dd-WO-3-C EDWIN WILLARD DEMING cA Sketch Edwin Willard Deming, the internationally known painter and sculptor of American Indian and Animal life, was born of pioneer stock in Ashland, Ohio, on the 26th of August, 1860. His grandfather, as a boy, had traveled with his parents in overland wagons from Sandersfield, Massachu- setts. They were the pioneers of 1815 who settled on the western reserve, then a part of Connecticut and now Ohio. When Deming was six months old he also became a pioneer, as he was taken to Geneseo in western Illinois where his father and grandfather had entered a tract of land on what had been the Fox and Sac reservation; there, from early childhood, Deming associated with the Red people of the Winnebago tribe, and learned to love them as brothers. Deming’s parents had settled on a vast prairie land dotted with many swamps full of water fowl, streams full of fish, and a country full of game and fur bearing animals such as wolves, beaver, muskrat, lynx, mink, and other animals that the small boys used to trap and spear during the winter to make their pocket money. At twelve Deming shot a big grey wolf and proudly brought it home on his pony’s back to show his mother what a fine hunter he was. This living in the wilderness was a pleasure and not a hardship; in fact, he felt sorry for the boys who had to live in the small town that had sprung up five miles away. About a mile and a quarter from his home was the little school-house Deming and his brother attended for several years. They had to walk each morning and this was not 9 much fun when the thermometer was 40° below zero. Later, the two boys went to school in town. The teachers, at the little country school house, were usually soldiers just back from the war and of one of these the boys were especially fond because he had only one arm and could turn a hand spring. School Jasted from eight in the morning until four in the afternoon and then it was too dark to play; but Saturdays were days of joy. The skating was fine on the frozen rivers and sloughs, and the favorite sport was spearing muskrats through the ice and digging mink out of the banks. At this time of the year the Winnebago Indians came down from Wisconsin and camped along the different streams for the trapping and hunting, and the little red boys of this tribe were among the first playmates young Deming had. He would sit around the camp fires of these (even to this very small boy) most interesting people, listening to their stories and learning the customs of these friends. The low temperature made little difference to these pioneer boys of Deming’s day, as they were dressed in wolf and buffalo skin coats and they had learned what a severe master the “White Man of the North” was. They must keep their fingers from touching the frosted steel runners of their skates, or they would leave some skin on their skates and have mighty sore fingers. These boys knew they must take the horse’s bridle into the house and warm the bit before pressing it into the animal’s mouth to avoid his suffering agonies; in fact, pioneer boys of eight were as grown up and more inde- pendent than the sixteen or seventeen year old boys of to- day, and they had learned to do their share of the work. The house in which Deming lived was a frame structure on a hill with a hundred miles of prairie stretching to the north Io where the cold winds swept down upon it all winter. There were no furnaces in those days, the kitchen and living rooms were heated with stoves but the bed rooms were cold; the snow often formed drifts inside the windows and the bed- clothes were frozen stiff from the moisture of the boy’s breath. Children did no loitering about their dressing; it was a quick jump out of bed, into clothes, and down to the stove to get warm—still, in spite of the cold, everybody had a good time sleighing about to visit one another during the day, and in the evenings they sat around the warm fire reading, popping corn, or listening to the yarns of some returned soldier. On Sunday Deming’s father always turned the clock an hour ahead so everyone would be ready to leave on time for church in the village five miles away. The whole family knew this and didn’t worry as the time was slipping past the hour they should leave. On one side of the farm, along the river, was a stretch of timber; this was a part of the pasture and the cows browsed there all day. Just before night, Deming used to go after these cows and bring them home. One evening he could not find them and he wandered through the timber, calling, but it was getting dark and the boy was getting worried and very soon he was lost. His imagination was very vivid, and soon every squirrel’s nest and every dark shadow was a lynx and every clump of bushes hid one. Only a few days before, an old settler going home one night, found the door ajar and, entering his log cabin, was attacked by a lynx. This story was fresh in the small boy’s mind; he knew he was going to be attacked and he had no gun with which to protect himself. Soon he thought he heard footsteps following him, then he knew he heard padded feet coming closer and closer, and finally he was sure he heard the footsteps of a lynx on the dry leaves. He was so frightened he could not even climb a tree and was only waiting for the attack. The lynx came on with ep a rush and sprang at him. He could not help himself and then he realized, to his great joy, that it was his old dog who had missed him and come to hunt him up. The boy fell on his dog’s neck and hugged him, and soon the dog turned around and led his little master back home and out of any further danger from the unknown things that always lurk in the woods at night in the vivid imagination of all small boys. Deming, as a small_boy, loved to draw and model. He drew birds and animals on the blank sheets on the backs of letters, and when he decided to use color in his work he found house paints and made them serve his wants. The clay he dug out of the creek served as modeling clay, and he sculped the animals and birds in this medium. The first pay he received for his art was when, as a little youngster, he received five dollars for painting a spread eagle on a piece of tin for a neighbor’s barn. About forty years later, when Deming revisited the old place, the farmer, still proud of the eagle on his barn, wanted to know if he would freshen up this first commission of the boy, which, needless to say, the now well-known artist did with great pleasure. When the honk of the wild geese going north told these prairie boys that the winter had broken, and the sap began to flow in the maple trees, trapping stopped; the fur of the animals was no longer valuable, and the muzzle loading shot guns were taken out and cleaned. Kegs of powder and bags of shot were brought out to the farm and the spring season opened up for wild fowl hunting. The birds came in count- less numbers—swan, geese and ducks filled the swamps, and immense flocks of wild pigeons almost darkened the sky. At night, the noise of their wings and the squawking sounded like a heavy wind. At this time the boys spent a month in 1p) their canoes, blinds and in other ways, shooting wild fowl for market, and thus earning some more spending money for the summer’s needs and pleasures. This was fun, but the sun soon drove the frost out of the ground and then came the days of hard work. The plowing days had arrived and the virgin soil had to be broken up. The farmers would hitch up five or six span of oxen or horses to drag the breaking plows. In the prairie country there was not the tedious work of clearing the timber and ridding the land of stone that Deming’s fore-fathers had in New England. After the plowing came the planting and cultivating, and the boy of ten or twelve had to do a man’s work. Then came the cutting of the wild prairie grass; the boys often had to drive the young prairie chickens away from the front of the sickle to avoid killing them; later in the fall, these birds that had hatched and grown up on the prairie and in the swamps would be full-fledged and strong of wing, then every farmer boy would be at his game of hunting again and the cracking of guns would be heard in all directions. After the planting and cultivating, there were always a few weeks when the work was not so heavy and the boys took their canoes, camping-kits, guns, fishing tackle and plenty to eat, dumped all into a farm wagon and drove off to the splendid camping ground on Rock River where two weeks’ vacation was spent in having a wonderful time. These boys really enjoyed their good times, for good times were so rare and scattered through the years of struggling to make an existence in this pioneer colony that each moment of pleasure was eagerly looked forward to and enjoyed to the limit. This Rock River camp was the old burying ground of the Fox and Sac Indians, and Deming found many an- cient stone implements and utensils at this interesting place. 13 The October frost dropped the leaves from the trees and nuts were gathered for the winter, the far-reaching corn fields were turned to brown and, before daylight every morn- ing, the rumbling of wagons over frozen ground could be heard as the farmer and his boys drove out to pick the great fields of corn. As the sun rose over the horizon, flocks of duck could be seen flying over and lighting. In the back of his wagon every boy carried his muzzle loader, and often, without leaving the wagon, he would drop ducks from a passing flock. Deming’s father had many head of cattle and, to keep them from wandering over the vast prairies, he had built the first fence in that section, enclosing a pasture field of one hundred and sixty acres. The greatest menace of the fall was the awful prairie fires, and the small boys were instructed by their fathers to keep a constant watch; the eyes of the older people were always scanning the horizon for the least sign of smoke or fire. If the tall, dry fall grass caught fire it swept over the prairie like a race horse, killing and burning everything in its path. Deming helped in beating out many of these prairie fires to save his home from ruin. As a safeguard he helped his father plow furrows and burn strips of prairie around the fields, house, stables and pastures. The year was divided into four very important periods, but not asitisin the city boy’s calender. First came Thanks- giving Day, the principal holiday of the descendants of the New England Puritans and it was marked by the gathering of all the relatives at the home of the grandparents where, for weeks in advance, the grandmother had been busily pre- paring for the great day by baking mince and pumpkin pies, breaking into her store of preserves made of the wild fruits and berries that grew in abundance on the prairies. By Thanksgiving day the heavy work of the harvesting was done, the bob sleds would be filled with straw and old and young piled into this conveyance. Then they tucked them- selves in with warm buffalo robes and with a merry jingle 14 of sleigh bells, started off for a holiday of good will and feast- ing on what the good old grandmother had prepared, to- gether with the wild turkey and other spoils of the wilderness, supplied for the feast by the good old grandfather. Next came Christmas, the day of presents. In those days the small boys were happy to receive the simple, but to them, wonderful home-made gifts the father and grandfather had prepared and worked out for them. Good will and kind thoughts spelled Santa Claus in those days and the presents were all handmade or useful gifts. The celebrated Christmas dinner dish was chicken pie baked in huge dish pans, and dried and preserved wild fruits took the place of the cider and apples that came later. New Year’s day arrived almost before the small boy’s stomach had recuperated from his attack on the Christmas goodies and was another great feast day. Feast days were especial points on the calendars in these primitive, pioneer days. The fourth period was the Fourth of July, a long stretch away, with the hard cold winter to battle between times and duly celebrated with noises of all kinds. The circus, in those days, came around at this time or, perhaps, a little later in the season. It was a one ring affair and used to travel through the country during the night. The Deming boys were fortunate for they lived on the main traveled road and, of course, the circus went right past their house. In the morn- ing, at daylight, the boys were up to see the tracks of the circus wagons, elephants and camels in the dirt and excite- ment ran high. The fences had been full of pictures an- nouncing the arrival of this wonderful and eagerly looked for event for some time and, naturally, the whole day was spent in town. Some of the precious money was taken from the funds the boys had saved up, but those who had not been lucky enough to earn anything, carried water for the tent men and so earned a ticket for the show. There the boys saw great bareback riding, men and horses doing stunts and many performing animals. After the show was over, more of the capital was used, for there was the after show, the sid Ts shows, and, of course, the circus would not be complete with- out the pink lemonade and popcorn. Later on, when the circus boasted of a two ring show, the boys felt they had been cheated, for no one could watch more than one ring at a time. The joy and excitement of the circus did not die down with the day, for all the stunts had to be tried out and many were the tumbles brought about by the slippery backs of the horses at home when the boys tried to imitate the bareback stunts. At about this time of the year, Deming’s grandfather would return from his annual trip to Ohio and he always brought back a pair of red-topped, copper-toed boots and a Barlow pocket knife for each of his little grandsons. These gifts were the envy of all the other boys around them, and the first thing to do was to don the boots and run for the first water hole to see if they were water tight. Deming’s exploring trips had been confined to the radius of a few miles, often riding to find stray cattle or horses, but he always had a great desire to see beyond the great purple hills that shut him off from some wonderful and mysterious country beyond. He nursed this wanderlust with all sorts of stories and strange ideas about the unknown country and fanned into flame a great desire to see into that mysterious land beyond his ken. From his camp on Rock River, he could often hear the deep toned whistle of the Mississippi River boats. They always seemed to call to this small boy of much imagination. Nothing seemed to satisfy him until one day, after long saving and planning for the great event, he found himself standing on the hurricane deck of the old stern wheeler, Josephine, of the Diamond Joe Line, watching the swirling of the rapids as she pulled up stream on the “Father of Waters: The Diamond Joe Line was a freight as well as a passenger line and on each side she pushed a barge. This was in ac- cordance with what he had read in Mark Twain’s new book; the loading and unloading was done by negro roustabouts, many of the older ones had been brought over as slaves. 16 Between landings all of them would gather on one of the barges and sing old African and plantation songs, most of them in deep bass voices, while a few sang in the high falsetto, and to this day Deming has never forgotten the thrill of that music. As the boat landed, the gang plank was run out and these negroes, going single file, carried the cargo on their heads to the dock. One of the old men extemporized a song, and every negro kept perfect time with his body as well as with his voice. This was shortly after Mark Twain had written his “Life on the Mississippi,” and everything was still as he had recorded it: the old Southern planters, the gamblers, and the mate whose profane vocabulary has become classic. Four days up the river and three days coming back com- pleted this new and most interesting experience, but only whetted Deming’s appetite for more adventure into the unknown and mysterious country and he went back home, not a satisfied boy, but one only looking forward to working hard and earning enough to go again and, this time, further to the west. Soon after this, Deming had a chance to go down into what was then Indian Territory. It did not take him long to accept this opportunity and after a trip on the railroad and then in an old stage coach, he found himself among the Ponca Indians where he spent some time living with the Poncas, Osages, Otoes, Pawnees and other tribes. Here he made many sketches and studies at a time when the Pawnees lived in their earth lodges and many other tribes in buffalo skin tipes, long since a thing of the past. After spending some time among these red people and studying their language, Deming had to return but he had positively made up his mind that his object in life was to record the old time life and customs of the Indian and that his profession would be that of an artist. Upon the boy’s return home in the fall of 1880 his father told him they had decided that he was to take a course in business law. He and his brother were sent to Chicago to 17 study and Deming spent a very miserable three months try- ing to become a lawyer, but the result was a decision to give this up and study art, in spite of every obstacle. Therefore in the fall of 1883, after selling a number of his Indian ponies, he came to New York and spent the winter studying at the Art Students’ League. In the fall of 1884, having raised the funds for tuition and traveling expenses, he went to Paris and studied at Julien’s academy under Boulenger and Le- Febvre and took a course of lectures at the Beaux Arts. In the fall of 1885, Deming returned to America and shortly afterward was engaged in helping to paint the cycloramas that were so popular in various parts of the United States at that time. In 1887, he went among the Yuma Apaches and Pueblos of the Southwest and the Umitillas in Oregon. The summer of 89 he spent with the Crows living on the Little Big Horn, and in the fall of the same year and 1n ’go0 he was with the Sioux. At the “Ghost Dance Outbreak” at Standing Rock, when Sitting Bull was killed, Deming was living with them and made paintings and photographs of Chief Gaul, Rain- in-the-Face, and others, and also of the ceremonies and war dances they were engaged in. The year of ’91 was spent in New York working up and painting the studies he had made on his various trips, and in the year ’92 he married and took his young bride out for a year’s trip to record the customs and folklore of the Puebloes, Navajo and Apaches of New Mexico and Arizona. Seven months of the year of 93 were passed in old Mexico to record the life of the Mexican Indians and then he went to Yucatan where he made studies and photographs. Since then he has spent much time among the various tribes of northern Indians both in the United States and Canada, and in ’98 a summer with the Pegans added much to his knowledge in a record he made of the Sun Dance given by Running Crane’s wife as a thanksgiving offering for Running Crane’s recovery from a severe illness during the - winter. That summer he was adopted into the Blackfoot 18 tribe by White Calf, an old chief, and in 1914 Deming took his whole family among these people and introduced them to the life and people that he loved. The Indians adopted the whole family to show the artist their appreciation of his kindness to them and their love for him who was, to use their own words, “making a record so their children and grand- children could see how their fathers lived.” Mr. Deming spent much of the time between 1898 and I914 studying the various Eastern tribes of Indians, but in 1917 the World War broke out and he moved to Washington where he instructed the 4oth engineers in marksmanship; ‘and in 1918 was commissioned Captain in the National Army and sent to Camp Perry, Ohio, to take charge of camouflage and to give special target instruction. When the school was transferred to Camp Benning, Georgia, Captain Deming went with it and while there painted the designated targets that have been lithographed and now are used in all Army and National Guard schools in the United States where shooting is taught. Later, he was transferred to the Springfield Armory where he introduced a new stock for the Army rifle. After resigning from the army, Mr. Deming spent seven months in South America in exploration work, and visited the Motolone Indians, a tribe of little people in the U. S. of Colombia, known to be cannibals. Since his return to New York Mr. Deming has continued his work of recording the old time American Indian, carrying out the idea of his childhood days when he played with the little Winnebagoes. 19 THe Goop Luck ARROW Owned by John Berwind 20 To E. W. Deming: _ The enclosed lines, a tribute to the charm of your picture of like title. The reproduction in the international Studio gave me a good idea of its potential beauties. ALFRED L. DonaLpson. Saranac Lake, Franklin County, N. Y. “THE GOOD LUCK ARROW” 1 A lonely brave of lithe and tapering length, Looms from the evening folds of damask light— A copper-colored cameo of strength, Carved on a dusky panel of the night. oh He stands at gaze on lone Kiwassa’s shores, Whose waters at his feet faint plashments make, While from the sky, veiled in fine films of gauze, A slumbrous sheen falls on the purple lake. The hunter’s eye is on the misty moon That silvers slowly in a cloud-spun weft. He turns not at the wailing of a loon, Nor heeds the track a ten-tined buck has left. 4. But soon he fits an arrow to his bow, And bends it double with a grip of steel, Then, aiming at the silver-tangled glow, He sends aloft his missile of appeal. ie So speeds the “Good Luck Arrow” thru the air, An offering to the goddess of the chase— The feathered utterance of a fervid prayer, The childish ritual of a childish race. And do we smile in pity at this deed Devoutly done to win Diana’s boon? First let us ask if arrows from our creed Are never aimed at some far-phantomed moon? AtFrRepD L. DonaLpson. QI EXPLANATION OF PICTURES Very little is known by the layman of the primitive Redman’s religion and folklore. It attracted less attention than his warfare but war was carried on to preserve the life of the warrior and his family and to save his home, his hunting grounds and his customs that are now forgotten even by the Indians themselves. Everything the Indian did was preceded by prayer, an appeal to his Supreme Being, the Great Mystery, or one of his helpers, the sun, moon, stars and earth, for success and strength. Deming has witnessed them go through many of their rites and when he last visited the Blackfoot Indians in Montana, Medicine Owl, Big Moon, Four Bears and Whitegrass made a prayer to the sun, asking that Eight Bears, (Deming) and his family be protected against all evil spirits while he was on their reservation where he went to paint and to make moving pictures of their old ceremonies and a record of their sign language. There is so much that is not known about our old time Indians, it would take more than one life time to make a complete record of their primitive life, but Deming has spent much of his life living with them and studying their interesting rites, customs and folklore and it is these pictures he hopes to see placed in a public gallery where they will help educate the people and show the new Americans what the old Americans, our first people, really were. While the pictures were hanging in the National Gallery in Washington, a group of old time Indians paid a visit to the Smithsonian Institute. The director took them in to see Deming’s pictures and then they went all over the building to see the rest of the exhibits. After they were through, they asked to see Deming’s pictures again. They looked at them a long time, silent, except for an occasional word to one another and finally the old chief turned to the director and said, ‘““That man, he paint.” They could not have better expressed their appreciation of the pictures. They recognized their warfare, their sacred religious rites, their folklore, and their domestic life in picture. The Indian’s prayers to the Great Mystery had to be within himself; he went off, alone, where he could commune in solitude, perhaps on a mountain top during a storm, to make an appeal for strength to overcome trouble as in the “Prayer to the Great Mystery” (page 24). In the “Prayer to the Manes of the Dead” (page 28) the Indians are making offerings to the spirit of the bear, apologizing for having killed him, but explaining the necessity of food and clothing. The animal people are the Indian’s brothers and he never kills them except for needful purposes. O-E-OM- BE-LA, the vision, (page 8) tells the story of an Indian who has reached manhood and gone off by himself to fast from four to eight DADE days and commune with the Great Mystery. During this fast, he hopes the underground and underwater people (spirits of departed animals) will help him. Each animal, the Indians believe, has his own attributes and the one coming to the supplicant for help first, will give him whatever power it possesses. That animal will be the man’s totem through life. The “Grass Dance” (page 26) was an appeal for success before the Sioux went on the warpath and was danced in Running Antelope’s camp just before Sitting Bull, the Sioux medicine man, was killed. One of Mrs. Harriman’s panels (page 7) is an old warrior haranguing a group of braves before starting on the war-path. In Mrs. Harriman’s murals, Deming has taken the country adjacent to her home as a back- ground and introduced the native tribes and their life. On the “return of a successful war party,” the warriors put on their war dress and ride through the camp, singing their war songs. (page 36). The “Vow of Vengeance” is portrayed by a woman, whose brave has been killed, vowing over his dead body to avenge his death. These women go on the war-path alone and, in most cases, have neither fear nor mercy. (page 30) The Indian mythology equals the myths of the Greeks. ““The Indian Orpheus” on page 32 represents Manabozho playing his flute and calling the animals, who teach him their language and the secrets of the woods. This is also the story in sculpture, in the photograph on page 44. The “Spirit of Famine,” perhaps one of the most weird pictures in the folklore series is an old witch with her pack of phantom wolves. The raven is the messenger of starvation and is followed by an old witch with her pack of wolves. They gradually overrun the country until they devastate it and the Indians suffer famine. (page 40) One of the best pictures in Deming’s collection is the “Passing of the Buffalo” painted at the suggestion of Mr. E. H. Harriman. It tells of the immense herds of buffalo coming from every canyon and passing on, into the land of the setting sun. The “Mourning Brave” (page 42) depicts the sorrow and love of a brave, mourning his helpmate, making a silent appeal over her dead body for strength to bear his loss and asking The Great Mystery to help her over the path that leads to the Happy Western land beyond the Great Waters. 23 PRAYER TO THE GREAT MyYSsTERY 24 New York, February 27 1925. One of the most agreeable evenings in America was spent with Edwin Willard Deming. His historical knowledge of the Indian, based on personal experience of many years—his sympathetic appreciation of this noble race, filled me with regret that I too could not have shared in such vivid and poetic emotions. ZULOAGA, MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN Heye Foundation Broadway at 155th Street, New York. To interpret the Indian, whether scientifically or aesthetically, one must kwow him. It is not sufficient for the artist to regard him as a picturesque subject, for if he would put on canvas that which is found beneath the Indian’s skin, and especially if he would read him as a highly spiritual and imaginative soul, he must gain that intimacy which only long and sympathetic contact can bring. Edward Willard Deming knows his Indians, whether of the northern plains or of the semi-arid Southwest. He knows their souls and thus has been able to preserve in colors much of what they thought but did not often tell—and this at a time before they were despoiled of their heritage. F. W. Hopce. March 2, 1925. Letter from Fredrick Remington Lurot Prace, Ridgefield Connecticut. My Dear Deming:— I have built the place up here and it has cost me a lot of money, so much that I can’t do any thing for some time to come but my plan is to panel the dining room if they come my way, and when I do I will get you to help out with a panel or two. You ought to get a lot of work along that line—it is a thing which is much in demand and your stuff and treatment lends itself so to it. I haven’t a bit of that decorative feeling and must go on doing easle pictures in competition with the old masters (faked) and some of the early molasses boys and the late Dutch to whom out of doors looks like a full cream cheese. Yours, FREDRICK REMINGTON. Wednesday. 25 ‘ALE WY ep uoyy "AONV(] SSVU5) aH Letter from an Omaha Indian. SMITHSONIAN InstiITUTE, Wash. D. C. ‘Jans 20;"to92a, My Dear Deming:— There was never a time when I visited your studio and examined your Indian pictures that I did not come away with a sense of pleasure and satisfaction, for they always carried me back to the days of my boyhood when I witnessed scenes such as you portray. The one, I think a panel, showing the moving of a tribe over the prairies is full of action and is true to nature in every detail. In it there is nothing in action or apparel, that is incongruous or out of place, as is often the case in many of the Indian pictures we see. One can read in all of the paintings you have shown me, the sympathy of the artist with his subjects and an endeavor to be faithful to his art. The painting that you showed me of a band of mounted Indians charging over the prairies, took me back to the summer day when the Omaha, Pawnee and Ponca hunters charged upon a great herd of buffalo at the head of the Plum Creek, a tributary of the Platte. I, as a fun loving boy, was in the midst of that exciting chase and saw it all. It was a picture that quickly passed but was not easily forgotten. You are doing good work. Like the passing of the great buffalo herds, the “wild” life of the Indian is passing, and in a short time nothing will remain of it excepting in the pictures which you are doing. Your friend, Francis LAFLESCHE. dvaq HL dO SUNVJ\] FHL OL UAAVU 28 30 East 42nd Street, N. Y. C. March 8th, tg165. My Dear Mr. Deming:— Three cheers! I am just as pleased as possible about those two pictures. I congratulate the other party to the contract a good deal more than I congratulate you. I thank you for the two little books which I have just received and which I very much appreciate. Good Luck to you and yours! Sincerely yours, THEODORE ROOSEVELT. NationaL Museum, Washington, D.C. Dear Friend Deming, You don’t know how much I miss the noble line of pictures of yours that hung in the museum so long. I was used to go out and commune with the Indian Orpheus and the Bear Worshippers every once in a while and get spiritual food from others of your pictures that were always near me. I am very disconsolate that they are gone. I only hope that our galleries and collectors of pictures will have the vision to see that your pictures must constantly increase in value. Posterity will condemn them if they don’t collect when the collecting 1s practicable. With great regard, Yours Wa LterR Hovucu. March 3, 1924. 29 AONVAONAA JO MOA SH], 30 American Museum of Natural History, N. Y. C. March 6, 1921. My Dear Deminec: This note is to congratulate you on your good fortune, and wish you well upon your journey. I am sure that you will bring back a lot of new data and will add one more contribution to your long list of achievements. I am sure of this because you, above all, have been able to get inside the Indian life and to see the world as the Indians see it. This is no mean accomplishment, and is the basis of the appeal your work makes to all of us. And again, it is because you have this genius for penetrating into the inner life of the Indian, that your visit to the still wild natives of the Amazon country promises so much, and I doubt not that you will bring back to us our first glimpse of what is in their minds. Wishing you a pleasant and fruitful journey, I am Sincerely yours, CLarK WissLer, Pu.D., Curator of Dept. of Anthropology. Extract rrom ArTICLE BY Epwarp Hace BrusuH E. W. Deming is at home with either the modeler’s tools or the palette and brush and believes that, with such a wealth of native artistic material we possess in this country, there is little occasion to go abroad for subjects. In the Red Man’s folklore, in the tales of the war path and hunt he has heard in the tepees and at camp fires, he has found inspiration for paintings and sculpture. Typical of this is a series of library decorations he has recently executed portraying incidents in the life of Hiawatha. They are founded on the real traditions of the Red Man about the life and teachings of this personage, stories which the artist, himself, has heard the aborigines recite. In a painting entitled “Defiance” and in a series of panels portraying “Old Time Life on the Plains,” shown at a recent exhibition, the artist has made valuable contributions to the native history, customs and phases of life that are destined very soon to pass from the scene. yt! sas He INDIAN ORPHEUS 32 From The Brooklyn Museum Quarterly, January, 1923. Tue Arr or Epwin Wittarp Deminc By Herbert B. Tschudy The American Indian is yet to become what might be called a fixed quantity, for he is open to exploitation in some manner—fair or otherwise—by the shrewder people of the wo1ld. Only within the last few months considerable interest has been aroused in the economic status of the Pueblo tribes of the Southwest, because of the brazen attempt to take from the Indians the little tillable land they have succeeded in retaining in the path of modern advance- ment. So completely has the Indian been surrounded by civilized con- ditions that it is to be wondered he has kept anything at all of his primitive life. However, as time goes on, in spite of this gradual loss of character we turn regularly to the Red Man and his country for artistic inspiration! One would naturally assume that of all the new things America had to offer the pioneer and the early American painter as well, the Indian would have commanded fitst attention; yet, upon reviewing our art productions of the half century preceding the last great move against the Indian in the eaily ’70s one finds little of interest except from the standpoint of its value as the earliest and, pre- sumably, most reliable, pictorial record of unchanged primitive life. The hordes of land-seekers that swarmed westward through Ohio and Indiana into the Mississippi Valley and over the great plains to the Rockies were relentless in their quest for wealth. In this great migratory force which overwhelmed the Indians, the softening, saving grace of the love of the picturesque and beautiful in nature, as is always the case, found little encouragement, for the battle against stubborn, primeval conditions made their vision of permanent habitation and its attendant refinements of dim outline at best! Riding high on the crest of this irresistible movement westward, there were a few who saw disappearing, steadily but inevitably, in its path a primitive, yet fascinating, culture; and among them was a boy, Edwin Willard Deming, the farm-boy of western Illinois. Going with his parents at an early age to a country still inhabited by Indians, Deming had his first contact with the life of these people at the very door of his home, and from the time of this mingling, as a lad, with the children of the Winnebagos, who came to this part of the old Sauk and Fox reservation to hunt and trap, to the present day he remains one of the few artists whose apprecia- tion of things Indian has the real foundation of personal, early-life association. 33 In his search for subjects for his pictures and statues, among which are some of the most genuine and beautiful contributions to American Art, his work as a student and portrayer of aboriginal American life has taken him into nearly all the chief latter-day Indian communities from Hudson Bay to Mexico. Many artists in the last half-century have found in the Indian an inspiring source of artistic expression—a number have come from foreign countries to try their hand in this alluring field—but few have more than skimmed the surface, either because of lack of ability to understand the real spirit of the Red Man, or, in some cases, because of a deficiency in that first hand knowledge which is procurable only at a cost of great patience and physical stamina. To-day the body of the Indian is brought close to us by railroad and automobile, but his spirit is all but gone and, while future artists will continue to find in the remnants of the race good material for the graphic arts, they will find it necessary more and more to rely upon the first-hand impressions of the pioneers in ethnologic research and upon such artists as Deming if they would give the basis of truth to their conceptions. Deming is the pioneer in every sense of the word to this generation of Indian painters; for so closely did he follow upon the trail of the Indian in his last stand against the United States Government that he shared with soldiers and Indians alike many exciting adventures and not always in the role of modest observer. Thus, in giving to the reader of the Museum Quarterly an esti- mate of the artistic value of Mr. Deming’s work, the writer lays great stress on this most important and valuable feature of the artist’s gift to posterity—namely, its sincerity. But Deming in seeking the truth became the poet. He saw deeper than the mere outward show of color and action, and set himself to put into graphic form the inner feelings of these people whose life was in its essence close-linked with the forces of nature. Deming’s early drawings were more illustrative than otherwise, but running through much of his earlier work was a promise of a more poetic vision which culminated in his fine decorative panels and in the pictures which depict Indian Mythology—a theme not likely to furnish inspiration to the realists of today. Here Deming has reached his highest point, whether expressed in subject- pictures, decorations or sculpture. The American Indian in real life is far from being the stern for- bidding creature so widely the popular idea /of his character: he is on the contrary imaginative, poetic at times, and always keenly humorous. Few of our artists have succeeded so completely detaching the Indian from modern life as has Deming in the pictures and small 34 bronzes shown in the Museum. The pioneer settler, the army man, or even the ethnologist, does not appear here to disturb the life of these people of the wild, so well has the artist kept his cherished subjects free from entanglements. We have established in the Southwest a colony of artists and authors who are making the Indian the subject of their several means of expression, but one is tempted to think, when viewing their work of art or reading their books, that they have arrived on the scene too late to get much that is primeval. All Indian tribes have absorbed much from the white race, and all have practised tribal exchange of ideas and things, consequently even the highly trained scientist finds it hard to trace to its source a cultural expression in which he is interested. Deming has never hesitated to go as far as a white man dared to go to see unsullied primitive life laid bare, but where he has com- promised the “artistic license” has been quite well justified and is not a basic fault. In the Animal Life invariably associated with the Indian, the bear, wolf, coyote, crow, eagle, rattlesnake, or any one of the host of wild creatures of mountain or plain, Deming has found worthy subjects for paint or clay. His small bronzes are unusually fine in execution and faithful in his animal characteristics, and he has embodied in them the sentiment of the Indian in a manner so beautiful as to lift them to a very high plane of artistic achieve- ment. AMERICAN Press ASSOCIATION Where artists are not confined to portraying actual events and are free to indulge their love for native subjects and their fondness for decorative effects at one and the same time, the results are often most pleasing. The work of Edwin Willard Deming illus- trates this idea. He is a lover of the life of the plains, with all its freedom and absence of artificial restraint and his paintings and sculpture evince this fact. He is at home with either the modeler’s tools or the palette and brush, has lived among the Indians, has studied the habits of the wild animals, and believes that with such a wealth of native material as we possess in this country, there is little occasion to go abroad for subjects or to produce classic imitations. In the Red Man’s folklore and in the tales of the warpath and the hunt which he has heard recited around the camp fires and in the tepi, he has found inspiration for his paintings and sculpture that tell us a great deal about the life he has studied. Typical of this is a series of library decorations he has recently executed por- traying incidents of the life of Hiawatha. They are founded on the real traditions of the Red Man about the life and teachings of this a) SONOS UVM JAL personage, stories which the artist himself has heard the aborigines recite. In a painting entitled “Defiance” and in a series of panels illustrating “Old Time Life on the Plains,’ shown -at a recent exhibition, the artist has also made valuable contributions to the record of native history and customs and phases of life that are destined to pass from the scene very soon. Tue Wortp. July 11, 1909. The following article on Deming was written especially for this newspaper by Commendetore Ettore Ximenes, the famous Italian sculpture and art critic, who in his capacity as Director of Fine Arts in the Italian Department of Education is now in America studying our Art Schools and Museums. Extract. As a matter of fact in Deming’s studio are canvases that might have been painted by Velasquez, others by Fra Angelico, others by Van Dyke, and others by Botticelli. Between the “Medicine Man” and the “Morning Star” breaking through the mist, there lies an abyss. So the “Laments of the Widowed Brave” and the “Vow of Vengeance”’ in no way resemble the “Departure for War” and the “Return in Triumph.” “The Prayer to the Sun”’ is different from “The Indian Lovers.” ‘The War Dance’”’ is unlike ‘““The Appeal to the Great Mystery.” “The Greetings to the New Moon” 1s a contrast against the “Spirit of Evil,” and “The Prayer to the Spirit of the Dead Animal” is totally different from everything else as is “The Arrival of the Puritans in 1620.” And I do not speak of the varied impressions produced by some of the studies and sketches which are a complete revelation of a genius that is mature and replete with poetry. An atmosphere full of air and light glows in every one of these productions. His transparent and imperceptible horizons convey a sense of infinite poetry. The living creature, everything that appears in his land- scapes, now rhythmically composed, now a contrast with each other in tone and line, all are a hymn to nature, exhaling the perfumes of the virgin soil and of flowers interlaced with turf. The stagnant water of the dead marshes mirrors the universe; the animal wan- dering over the immensity of the prairies, watches and listens in silence. If Narcissus does not mirror himself in the limpid water, he plays the flute like Orpheus, inspiring men and beasts with love. InscrIPTION IN Book BY FREDERICK DELENBAUGH Member of the Explorers Club To my good friend. E. W. Deming who is so familiar with the old Great West, its Indians and its literature, I wish to express my admiration for his genius in representing that field in paintings that will be priceless in the future. FREDERICK S. DELENBAUGH. New York, January 12, 1923. : ey THE CRAFTSMAN, IQII By Mary Fanton Roberts An interesting, recent exhibition presented the paintings and bronzes of Mr. E. W. Deming. We have often spoken of Mr. Deming’s work in the Craftsman, and have felt the profoundest admiration and the closest sympathy for the quality of his art. He is a student of Indian life; a careful, conscientious observer, a sincere reporter of the ways of their history and picturesque qualities. And with all these practical details as the foundation for his art, he has also the quality of imagination which is stimulating toward this one romantic race in America. Mr. Deming feels the legends and traditions and customs of the Indian as this vanishing race itself has felt them. In a poetical mural decoration for Mrs. C. C. Rumsey he has painted the spirit of the water. At a first glimpse there is only the sense of the warm mist over the pearly blue lake, and then slowly creeping from the mist, as mythological figures are forever creeping from the mist of tradition, is the wistful outline of the water goddess—pale, fragile, etherealized. In all his Indian work, whether his figures are in the war dances, at prayer at sunrise, or placating the gods of the underworld, Mr. Deming is seeing and painting as one having a vision of the fundamental truths which were religion to these people. And one feels in his painting of nature the same subtle understanding of her spiritual moods that he portrays when he presents the little known and beautiful mysteries of the Indian religion. Perhaps no one has ever more exquisitely revealed the first blush of dawn, the mystery of moonlight, the changing gray of twilight, the tragic depths of loneliness in the first daybreak in woods and prairies. It does not matter in these essentially poetical delinea- tions of nature whether the figures which relate them to life are the old tribes which have so long inhabited the western edge of the continent, or the animals which are now almost extinct. Each living thing in the scope of Mr. Deming’s art is bathed in his rare and subtle power of relating life to nature and encompassing both with the mystical charm which nature gives in her strange silent moments. At this exhibition of Mr. Deming’s there are several studies for the Harriman decorations which Mr. Deming has just completed. These are painted in a very high key, perhaps higher than one would feel in the actual instance and surroundings of the Indian life. And yet the tone does not so much seem to render over- poetical the delineation as to suggest a certain subphase of life which was inherent in Indian character, and which might have escaped in the more blatant tones of harsh contrasts which are often so possible to find in the West. In any case, Mr. Deming 38 has chosen the lighter key for all his recent Indian decorations, and these decorations seem to grow more and more to express the mystical side of the Indian life. One cannot but feel that this artist has chosen wisely in selecting the tones which have for him unquestionably the value of symbolism. Happily in the Indians which Mr. Deming has so faithfully loved and has so faithfully portrayed, he takes no cognizance of their existence as a modern disorganized race. He tells us only of the Indian as a free spirit; of the men who led their lives accord- ing to their own impulse and religion. And he shows us as a result of this freedom, beauty of physique, sincerity of religious attain- ment and standards of right social intercourse. The Indians as we see them today are but one little edge of a civilization to which they do not belong, and from which they will eventually drop away, except as they grow weak enough to become absorbed. In any case, they have no significance either to historian or artist. Whereas the race from which they descended, the once rulers of the con- tinent, were men of joy and spiritual contentment, of personal dignity and beauty, and of wise simplicity of existence. These are the things Mr. Deming is recording from day to day, recording with sincerity and artistic significance, in his mural decorations, his easel pictures and his bronzes. CHRISTIAN ScriENCE MoniIror Article by Robert Macbeth Few of our painters are as familiar with the great outdoors of our Western country and with the wild life that characterizes it as E. W. Deming. His paintings are what might be expected from a man so sure of his subjects, with the technical knowledge that admirably permits him to secure his effects. They are spread over a wide range of years and subjects, but in each Mr. Deming has a mes- sage for us, from the big “Spirit of Famine,” a truly terrible con- ception, to the delightful little sketches of scenes in the northern forests. The bronzes, too, are excellent for they reveal a man that is equally at home in two mediums. Here most of his subjects are the wild animals he has known: the bear, bison, antelope and mountain sheep; but his Indian masks are finely modeled and lend a dis- tinguished note to his collection. 39 aANINV] JO LIWIdS FH] 40 t THe Ficutr Bronze BEAR AND PANTHER Metropolitan Museum of Art. 41 THe Movurninc BRAVE National Museum, Washington, D. C. THE New York TIMES An intimate knowledge of the American Indian is spread in an article in the American Museum Journal by E. W. Deming, and it might be said that Mr. Deming speaks with the heart and voice of the Indian because he has lived among them as an adopted son. Mr. Deming admires them, feeling he knows their generosity and their wrongs as they know them. He believes in their good faith and honor, and much that is magnificent in them that has never been recorded; among other things, their deep poetic and religious sentiment. Tae NEw. ORK POST If it were safe or fair, and no doubt it is neither, to deal in a pic- turesque fashion with those who deal with the picturesque, one might say that Mr. Remington has seen the story of the hard- pressed native along the sights of a rifle, and Mr. Deming wrapped in one of their own blankets. He has, at any rate, taken the view- point of the Indian himself as far as that is possible. From season to season he has lived with one tribe or another and has even been admitted to honorary membership, privileged in the confidence of the chiefs and chiefs’ sons, intimate with all, speaking their lan- guage, leading their life, and sharing to some extent their thoughts. He seeks to depict it truthfully and intimately. An effort at interpretation of this sort has its difficulties. Es- pecially when it reaches the point of embodying religious beliefs and myths, the quality of the native imagination may show up rather theatrically in the translation. THe New York HERALD Probably no painter in this city has drawn his inspiration so thoroughly from the well of primitive folklore as has Mr. Deming, and his work reveals a poetic appreciation of the life which he knows through association with the red men. 43 Manasoza, SCULPTURE 44 THe New York Sun Mr. Deming has lived among the Indians and traveled thousands of miles with or among them, both in the south and the north, before they had lost their old time ways of life, when it was still possible to learn directly the genius of their people, to gain an ethical understanding of their race. They made him their friend and had confidence in him. It even seems, sometimes, in his own personality that he early became so imbued with their taciturn spirit that he unconsciously suggests the reserve that characterizes the red man, leaving him thoughtful, with time to cultivate his powers of observation. Mr. Deming wastes no more words than does the Indian, and in his painting he does not resort to fictitious accessories. In the bronzes, too, Mr. Deming sticks to the wilder life for the most part. Here is a noble buffalo, carefully studied, a Rocky Mountain sheep, a she-bear with a turtle, each discovering the other by mutual surprise. Tue Eveninc Malt. Edwin Willard Deming knows the Indians and their life very well, and depicts them sympathetically. His exhibition of paint- ings and sculpture contain several excellent Indian paintings. The best, perhaps, is the “Spirit of Famine,” though the sym- bolism of this picture is not strictly in accordance with Indian notions. Indians do not conceive a spirit to represent an abstract idea, or fact of nature, such as hunger is. They lend a spirit to a tree, a rock, and to every species of animal. If they wanted a spirit of famine, they would think of the spirit of a wolf. Mr. Deming represents the spirit of famine by means of a crouching woman, behind and about whom is a band of vague, ghostly wolves and about whose head broods a raven. The picture is big, deep and dismally beautiful. “The Vow of Vengeance” is a fine picture, representing a woman whose father or husband has been slain, pledging herself to revenge his death in the presence of the medicine men. The group is full of power and suggestion. Several other Indian scenes show under- standing and force. Tue Sunpay Srar, Wasuincton, D. C. Edwin Willard Deming, who lectured before the Art and Arch- eology League in the Corcoran Gallery of Art, is one of our best known American Artists. He is also an illustrator, mural painter and sculptor, but he has specialized in depicting the life of the American Indians. 45 Partita List oF OWNERS OF THE BRONZES AND PICTURES Mrs. Hugh D. Auchincloss Mr. Larz Anderson Mr. Giles Atherton—England Judge Leon Armison—Cuba Mr. John Berwind Dr. Harlow Brooks Mrs. Witherbee Black Mr. George Bakeland, Jr. Mr. Irving Batchelor Mrs. Beaman Mr. J. C. Carrere Dr. C. G. Childs Dr. James Coughlan Dr. Kennicut Draper Mrs. Edward Delafield Mr. Edmund Driggs Mr. Victor Evans Dr. J. Ives Edgerton Dr. W. Evans Dr. Louis Frissell Mr. Frank Richards Ford Mr. Daniel Chester French Dr. Percy S. Grant Mr. Elmer Gregor Miss Alice Greenleaf Mr. George Heye Mrs. Oliver Wendell Holmes Mrs. E. H. Harriman Mr. Louis Hill Mr..F. W. Hodge Mr. John M. Holzworth Mr. Will Irwin Miss Annie B. Jennings Dr. Walter B. James Mr Arthur Curtiss James Mrs. Rita D’acosta Lydig Mr. Thomas Le Bouttlier Mr. Ogden Mills — Mrs. Gardner Millett Col. Alexander J. Macnab Mrs. John Milburn Dr. A. Merritt Mr. Carl MacFadden Mr. Joseph McAleenan Mr. J. M. Merriman Mr. Robert Macbeth Prof. Henry Fairfield Osborn Mr. A. Perry Osborn Mr. Percy Pyne Mr. George D. Pratt Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt Mrs. Carl Rumsey Mr. Benjamin Riegel Mr. Clarence B. Sturges Mr. Gustave W. Seiler Mrs. Willard Straight Mr. Roderick Stephens Mr. Michael Spellacy Mrs. M. Talbert Mr. Frederick K. Vreeland Mrs. Harry Payne Whitney Mrs. Payne Whitney Mrs. Casper Whitney Mrs. DeVere Warner Miss Esther Waterman Mr. Frederick Walcott Commendatore Ettore Xemenes —Italy 46 List or Works IN Pustic INSTITUTIONS. Metropolitan Museum of Art. American Museum of Natural History. National Museum, Washington. Heyes Foundation, Museum of the American Indian. Montclair Art Gallery. Morris High School. Explorers Club. National Arts Club, N. Y. C. Montifiore Home for Crippled Children. List or CLuBs. Cosmos Club, Washington D. C. Explorers Club, Active Member. National Arts Club, Artist Life Member. Society of Mural Painters. Sons of the Revolution, Washington, D. C. Yorktown Country Club, Va. Life Member. Washington Arts Club. Camp Fire Club of America. Authors League of America. pence Military Engineers, Garrison, 194Army & N Uni ’ Sw Aakers av 10 iy: wid Army and Navy Club of N.Y 47 me er ee rd 4 fe ' ‘ “ ; : “ = ; E 5 7 a ¥ Privately Printed _ Tue Riversipe Press in the ated City of New York tH - ik LA 5 3 a ae ~ . f a f ; & of F " é