BEAUTIFUL APPRECIATION: NATIVE AMERICAN VINTAGE PORTRAITS NOW

With Thanksgiving in our sights, we are thinking about all of the people and things we appreciate the most. Our thoughts turn to Native Americans because we believe they deserve more thanks, more consideration, and more admiration, both historically and today.

History comes to life much more vividly when you can see it in full color. And, today, we are featuring an achingly beautiful collection of vintage hand-painted photos of Native Americans, compiled by filmmaker Paul Ratner.

These photos were taken in the late 1800’s, before the introduction of Kodachrome film.

Gripping portraits show both strength and tenderness, from an Ojibwe arrowmaker, to the famous Minnehaha and Geronimo, to Piegan men giving prayer to the Thunderbird.

They are reminiscent of European royal portraits, but these are, perhaps, even more noble.

Ratner’s compilation was drawn from many different collections, including those of the Library of Congress and a number of natural history museums.

Long fascinated with the beauty and culture of Native Americans and other indigenous people, Ratner got the idea to start this compilation recently, while working on his new film, Moses on the Mesa.

The film follows a German Jewish immigrant, named Solomon Bibo, who falls in love with a Native American woman and later becomes governor of her tribe, the Acoma Pueblo, set in the 1880s, in New Mexico.

While researching the film, Ratner developed a passion for the old photographs of indigenous people that he found. Most were black and white. But the colorized ones struck him as even more compelling. They were at once powerful and delicate, photograph and painting. 

These photos capture a beautiful way of life. They are all that remain of a time when Native Americans flourished, living with dignity and grace before the Europeans and new “Americans” diminished them. 

Ratner asks, as we do, how anyone could want to exterminate such magnificent people.

It is through photos, like this, that we’ve come to appreciate the beauty of Native Americans on a much deeper level. And, we owe them our gratitude on so many levels.

You can find more from Ratner’s collection here. And check out his award-winning film here. Moses on the Mesa is also being turned into a television series, based on first-hand accounts of life in the Wild West with a strong focus on indigenous culture and history. Watch for it soon.

Read more about Beautiful Thanksgiving in The Beauty of Wild Turkeys Now, Beautiful Bison Bears & Thanks Now, Thankful For Heirloom Pumpkins Now, Contemporary Ancient: Native Portraits Now, Appreciating the Native Beauty of Algonquin Lands Now and 10 Beautiful Places to Say Thanks to our Bodies Now.

And check out more beautiful things happening now in BN Arts/Design, Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Place/Time, Mind/Body, and Soul/Impact Daily Fix posts.

Want more stories like this? Sign up for our weekly BN Newsletter, Like us on Facebook. Follow us on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr. Join our BeautifulNow Community and connect with the most beautiful things happening in the world right now!

Do you have amazing photos? Enter them in this week’s BN Photo Competition. We run new creative competitions every week! Now, it’s even easier to enter with the new BeautifulNow App!

Plus check out the rest of our App’s beautiful features. It’s free to download here.

IMAGE CREDITS:

1. Image: by William Herman Rau. Courtesy of Princeton Digital Library. Charles American Horse (the son of Chief American Horse). Oglala Lakota. 1901.
2. Image: by F.A. Rinehart. Courtesy of Boston Public Library. In Summer. Kiowa. 1898.
3. Image: by Roland W. Reed. Courtesy of Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Piegan Men Giving Prayer to the Thunderbird Near a River in Montana. 1912. Montana.
4. Image: by Heyn. Courtesy of Library of Congress. Bone Necklace. Oglala Lakota Chief. 1899.
5. Image: by Roland W. Reed. Courtesy of Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Northern Plains Man on an Overlook. Early 1900s. Hand-colored photo. Montana.
6. Image: Courtesy of Denver Public Library Digital. Cheyenne Chief Wolf Robe. 1898. Color Halftone Reproduction of a Painting From an F. A. Rinehart photograph.
7. Image: by Heyn. Courtesy of Denver Public Library Digital Collections. Chief Little Wound and Family. Oglala Lakota. 1899.
8. Image: by Walter McClintock. Courtesy of: Yale Collection of Western Americana, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Eagle Arrow. A Siksika man. Early 1900s. Glass lantern slide. Montana.
9. Image: by Roland W. Reed. Courtesy of  Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Handpainted Print Depicting Five Riders Going Downhill in Montana. Early 1900. Montana.
10. Image: by the Detroit Photographic Company. Courtesy of Library of Congress. Minnehaha. 1904. Photochrom print.
11. Image: by F.A. Rinehart. Courtesy of Boston Public Library. Geronimo (Goyaałé). Apache. 1898. Omaha, Nebraska.
12. Image: by William Henry Jackson. Courtesy of Montana State University Library. Chief James A. Garfield. Jicarilla Apache. 1899.
13. Image: by Roland W. Reed. Courtesy of Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Handpainted Print of a Young Woman by the River. Early 1900s.
14. Image: by BN App - Download now!
15. Image: The Detroit Photographic Company. Courtesy of Library of Congress. Arrowmaker, an Ojibwe Man. 1903.