Russell Among the Blood People
Near Great Falls, Montana
In eighteen eighty-eight, Charles Russell left the ranch circuit and spent time living among the Blood Indians, a branch of the Blackfoot Confederacy. He was twenty-four years old. He learned the rhythms of camp life, watched ceremonies, and absorbed the material culture of horses and painted lodges that he would spend the rest of his career recording accurately.
Scholars note that this time set his art apart from most Western painting, which depicted Native people as exotic backdrop. Russell had been there. The C.
M. Russell Museum in Great Falls holds about two thousand pieces of art, personal items, and artifacts tied to him, including dozens of his paintings, sculptures, and drawings. His log cabin studio, built in nineteen oh three, stands on the museum grounds as a National Historic Landmark, elk antlers still on the porch.
