Charles M. Russell: An American Artist Exhibition PapersFinding Aid by Jesse Swoboda
October 2004 INTRODUCTION TO THE COLLECTIONCharles Russell was born in St. Louis in 1864, the son of a rich brickmaking family. An unruly boy, he was sent to military school in New Jersey, but begged his parents to be allowed to go west to become a cowboy. They finally relented, and allowed 16 year old Charley to travel to Montana. Russell spent a short time on a sheep ranch, then took off for a period of two years, to live in a log cabin with an ex-prospector named Jake Hoover, hunting meat for the railroad crews. Skinning wild animals made Russell familiar with anatomy, especially that of the buffalo. He would become one of the best artists at depicting the buffalo, and often included the image or icon of a buffalo skull on the ground in the foreground of his paintings, a symbol of his lament for the near-eradication of what he considered a noble animal.Russell became a working cowboy beginning with the round-up of 1882. Russell at first painted what he saw or remembered as an aid to storytelling to amuse his friends. Called "the Cowboy Genius," Russell was always a storyteller first and a painter second. He could often be found in the nearest saloon during his cowboy days, amusing his friends with tales of bucking broncos, Indian women and Eastern dudes. As he began to express himself in drawings and paintings, Russell showed that he knew the West as a complete environment. He gave equal attention in his work to people, animals, plants, and the earth itself. Russell first came to fame for his watercolor of a dying steer entitled Waiting for a Chinook (1887). His early work was crude, but he improved with experience. He spent the winter of 1888 with a Blackfoot Indian band in Canada, learning the ways of the Indians at first hand, and collecting artifacts. His paintings of the Indian seem to fall into the category of the "noble savage." Russell was intrigued throughout his life with initial contacts between whites and Indians, recreating these scenes in image after image. In his historical paintings he recreated many scenes of the Lewis and Clark expedition, and Indian buffalo hunts, which he never actually saw. Russell worked as a cowboy until 1893; while passing through St. Louis in that year, he was given an offer of money for his paintings by Charles Neidringhaus, a minor steel magnate. After this offer, at age 29, Russell began to settle down and paint full time. He made Great Falls, Montana his home, and married 16-year-old Nancy Cooper in 1895. Nancy was a strong-willed woman. She rationed Charlie's whiskey, and took charge of the prices he got for his paintings. She drove a tough bargain, and was nicknamed "Nancy the Robber" by Great Falls locals, a name which followed her to New York galleries later in life. "She was the best booster and pardner a man ever had," said Russell. They moved into a big house in Great Falls as his art career blossomed, but Nancy was not satisfied with having Charlie's studio in the dining room. She had a log cabin constructed for him in back of the house, out of telephone poles. It became Charlie's retreat, as well as his studio. He hung his Indian and Cowboy paraphernalia on the walls, and recalled his teenage years in the mountains with Jake Hoover. As Charlie became better-known, trips to the East and the New York-centered art market were inevitable, although Charlie was uncomfortable there. He spent his time in New York's bars, while Nancy got top dollar for his paintings and bronzes. Russell, almost entirely self-taught, also absorbed ideas from the art he saw in the east, and returned to the west with a brighter palette after seeing the work of impressionist painters. By 1905, just ten years after he was fashioning little wax figurines in a Montana saloon for a round of drinks, Russell's bronze The Scalp Dance was selling in Louis Tiffany's alongside Remington's Bronco Buster and Augustus St. Gaudens' Diana. In 1914, the Russells made a tour of Europe, and in 1920 began to vacation in southern California. Russell made friends with movie stars such as Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford and William S. Hart. Russell was also a very close friend of Will Rogers, and their characters were often compared as being very much alike. Russell died in 1926. He once said that "Any man that can make a living doing what he likes is lucky, and I'm that." Russell’s respect for Native American culture and individuals is apparent in his writing and art, various motifs appearing countless times in his work. In addition to sketches, paintings, and sculptures, Russell was also known for his illustrated letters, full of eccentric spellings and cowboy witticisms. While for many years art historians saw Russell’s work as that of a careful and faithful documentarian or anthropologist, more recently they have begun to see his work as interpretation, at once deliberate and unconscious, of the world he depicted. In 1982, the organization known at the time as the Jefferson National Expansion Historical Association (now known as Jefferson National Parks Association) mounted a major exhibition of the artist’s life and work titled Charles M. Russell: American Artist. The first major special exhibit in the Museum of Westward Expansion located beneath the Gateway Arch, the exhibition was expected to mark the beginning of a series of exhibits demonstrating and analyzing the history of westward expansion in United States territories. A Curator of Special Exhibits was brought in specifically to oversee and bring to fruition the event. Russell was chosen as the subject of this first exhibition in part because of his St. Louis origins and the contemporary popularity of the Western Art genre. The organizers also believed the artist was an ideal subject for analysis and reinterpretation from the perspective of new attitudes about Western history and its presentation. The collection of documents and images pertaining to the exhibition in the GANP Archives includes papers extending from the earliest planning stages through correspondence concerning the return of pieces from the exhibition after its close three years later. The material provides a great deal of information on the artist, on the logistics and challenges of mounting an exhibition in a relatively untried space, and on past and contemporary ideas about the meaning of “the West” and its interpretation in such public venues. These papers demonstrate the difficulties inherent in challenging accepted beliefs about any seemingly fixed but, in fact, more enigmatic and changing concept—where “the West” can be an especially contentious subject. Information obtained from this collection must be properly cited, whether used in publication or in other formats. A citation suggested for this collection is: National Park Service Gateway Arch National Park Archives
Charles M. Russell: An American Artist Exhibition Papers Box__, Folder__ Researchers are advised that before records, photographs, and any other unpublished materials from this collection can be published or exhibited, permission from the National Park Service must be obtained in writing. |
Last updated: June 23, 2025