Tobacconist Figure: Indian

Dateca. 1850

MediumPainted pine

DimensionsOverall: 42 3/4 x 16 1/2 x 14 3/4in. (108.6 x 41.9 x 37.5cm)

Credit LineGift of Abby Aldrich Rockefeller

Object number1931.705.1

DescriptionA full-length, freestanding male figure wearing Native American attire and standing on a base amidst tall vegetation with two bundles of cigars behind him, his slightly raised proper left foot on a tobacco roll. He wears green, side-seamed, red-fringed leggings with red, bow-tied garters below the knees. His long-sleeved shirt is light green trimmed with red. His proper left arm is crooked at the elbow and held out in front of him, the fingers now mostly missing but carved to hold some (now missing) object. Two large feathers emerge from the front of his headband and curve back over his head. On his back, he bears a quiver of arrows and a brown, rough-carved blanket. [Could this have been interpreted previously as an animal skin, hence the longstanding title "Trapper Indian"?] His black hair is cut short in front of his ears and in short bangs over his forehead but falls long and straight behind his ears; it is delineated with incised carving. His skin is a dark brick red (the present [3/11/2008] paint scheme misinterpreting his upper thighs, which are painted bright red, not his brick red skin color). Artist unidentified.
Label TextThe Indian's ruffled trade shirt, breech clout, moccasins, leggings, and garters correspond more closely to eighteenth century Native American attire than the garb shown on most Indian tobacconist figures. Credible, rarely-depicted details include moccasin cuffs decorated with small tin ("tinkling") cones stuffed with deer hair (the crispness of their delineation now muted by multiple paint layers) and, suspended around the Indian's neck, a knife case (in this case, only partly visible above the neckline of the shirt). Frustratingly, however, the piece's origin remains elusive, and even its date is uncertain. The bundled cigars behind the Indian and, especially, the accordion-like stack under the man's foot link the figure to carvings made during the first half of the nineteenth century. The stack was a tobacco roll: a series of circular cakes of tobacco, usually ten to twelve inches in diameter, that were strung together for shipment. Although now damaged, the fingers of the hand across the chest were clearly carved to hold some object; a few other similarly posed figures show cigars in the hand.
The Indian's forward-leaning stance, the single arm across his chest, and the slight climbing positions of his legs echo the poses of countless mid-nineteenth century ships' figureheads. Because the same carvers so often created both kinds of figures, the correspondence is hardly surprising.

ProvenanceFound near Stockbridge, Mass., by Edith G. Halpert, Downtown Gallery, New York, NY; in 1931, purchased from Halpert by Mrs. John D. Rockefeller, Jr., who was CWF's donor.

Exhibition(s)