Artwork
Catlin and Two Companions Shooting Buffalo
Catlin and Two Companions Shooting Buffalo is an oil painting by the Impressionist artist George Catlin. It dates from 1865 and is held in the collection of the National Gallery of Art. Created in 1865, this oil painting on card, later affixed to paperboard, captures a dynamic hunting episode on the Great Plains.
About this work
Subject & Meaning
As a genre scene created in 1865, the work captures a specific moment of frontier hunting activity involving the artist and his associates.
The painting depicts the artist George Catlin accompanied by two companions engaged in the act of shooting buffalo. As a genre scene created in 1865, the work captures a specific moment of frontier hunting activity involving the artist and his associates. The composition includes natural elements, specifically trees, which frame the action within a landscape setting.
The subject matter represents the direct interaction between the observer-artist and the American West, documenting the pursuit of game as a central experience of the era.
Technique & Style
Created in 1865, this work is an oil painting executed on card that has been mounted onto a paperboard support. The piece functions as a genre scene, depicting figures engaged in hunting buffalo within a landscape that includes trees. While specific details regarding the artist's brushwork, surface condition, or handling history are not provided in the available records, the physical construction combines the flexibility of card with the rigidity of a paperboard mount. The composition measures 45.9 cm in height and 62.7 cm in width.
History & Provenance
George Catlin painted Catlin and Two Companions Shooting Buffalo in 1865. The work descended through his daughters Clara Gregory Catlin, Louise Catlin Kinney, and Elizabeth Wing Catlin. Elizabeth Wing Catlin sold it in 1912 to the American Museum of Natural History, which later disposed of it in 1959 via Kennedy Galleries, New York, to Paul Mellon. Mellon gifted the painting to the National Gallery of Art in 1965.
The work is held by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., where it entered the collection in 1965 as a gift from Paul Mellon of Upperville, Virginia. Mellon had acquired it in 1959 through Kennedy Galleries in New York, having purchased it from the American Museum of Natural History. The museum itself had obtained the painting in 1912 from Elizabeth Wing Catlin, one of George Catlin's three daughters, who inherited it directly from the artist.
The sources do not provide a specific inventory or accession number for the painting at the National Gallery of Art, nor any prior exhibition history.
Overview
Created in 1865, this oil painting on card, later affixed to paperboard, captures a dynamic hunting episode on the Great Plains. Three mounted riders fire at a herd of buffalo amid a sparse landscape dotted with a few trees, conveying the urgency and movement of the chase.
Context
The scene reflects the mid‑nineteenth‑century reality of buffalo hunts that were both a cultural staple for Indigenous groups and a target of commercial exploitation. Catlin’s depiction aligns with his extensive visual record of the Plains, offering contemporary viewers insight into the ecological and social transformations of the era.
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Artist & collection
Artist
George Catlin ( KAT-lin; July 26, 1796 – December 23, 1872) was an American lawyer, painter, author, and traveler, who specialized in portraits of Native Americans in the American frontier.
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