OCR Text |
Show 20 Indian, incompletely disguised in the diffused glow around the figure. Hurlimann, one of the very best of Bodmer's etchers, was responsible for many of the superb aquatint portraits in Travels.18 Because the figure was Hurlimann's specialty, it is likely that Bodmer, realizing the weaknesses of the figure in the first and second states, turned the job over to him. In this third state the totems have also been reworked-perhaps this time because the light source has been altered. They remain, however, basically true to the original watercolor. And for the first time, Tableau 25 was dated January 1, 1839. That this state is, indeed, the last state of the print is confirmed by examination of the restrikes included in Maximilian's collection at the Joslyn Art Museum. Bodmer, in acknowledging to Holscher the superior quality of this last state, gets to the very core of the matter. While pursuing images he thought would appeal to subscribers, Bodmer had progressively lost much of the beauty of the original straightforward document. By falling further and further back into established European romantic conventions with the first two states of Tableau 25, Bodmer also pulled the image further and further away from the original document. In the process the image lost much of its beauty because it had lost much of its truth. The Indians of the first two states had become distorted caricatures; the return to the original image in the third state recaptures much of the Mandan's factual and artistic integrity. |