One of my most profound moments on my travels along the Continental Divide in August 2020 was my time in Glacier National Park. It is by far becoming my favorite park in my psyche, almost uncontrollably as time goes by. Somehow Glacier National Park is edging out the Grand Canyon, as if I ever thought that was possible. My memories of those four days right outside the park waking up to the sunrise at the Johnny Point on the banks of the Hungry Horse Reservoir were some of my happiest days of my life. It was the light. The quality of the light was something special beyond words. And maybe it was the combination of my hammock, my camping coffee, and pine trees that made it perfect. I needed nothing else in life. The light would crest the boulders and create the halos of Kings and Queens of the Northern Rockies. It is a special kind of land. It is land of the Blackfoot tribe. At times, I feel like I was trespassing on a secret that was not necessarily meant to be found out.

As I get further away from those special days in the wilderness, I have found myself making more connections between the natural world and the artistic expressions in the early 20th century including artists Georgia O’Keefe, Ansel Adams, and Marsden Hartley. Another obsession is John James Audubon, but I will leave that for a later post. I have done deep dives into where these artists chose to live, create art, and live their lives mostly surrounded by the great wilderness of North America. They all experience a boomerang of movement from wilderness back to an urban setting (New York, Mexico City, and Paris are common threads).

I recently went to the NY Historical Society and unexpectedly learned about a new artist through the exhibit, The Art of Winold Reiss: An Immigrant Modernist. Each gallery seemed to be like a new discovery in Reiss’ impact on what we know as modern posters, typeface, metalworks, and portraiture. He was a diverse artist choosing many mediums and interests. It seemed he was curious in anything that New York City had to offer and radically advocating for diversity and inclusion along the way. He painted two of my favorite artists: Isamu Noguchi and Langston Hughes. He made friends in artist circles, as well as philanthropy across racial and economic divides. He must have been an affable man. Unsurprisingly, I turned the corner of the exhibition and was pulled to a three-fold pamphlet featuring an artist residency. Of course Reiss had an artist residency at Glacier National Park and of course he had painted portraits of the Blackfoot community as they were. As they are.

Reiss opened an art school along the shore of St. Mary Lake near the east entrance to Glacier National Park. It opened in 1931, and was open during the summers of 1934 and 1937 and included some other influential artists that I also enjoy including Charles Russell (“the cowboy artist”). He painted members of the Blackfoot tribe and the park’s wide-reaching landscapes. Much of his work was also commissioned by the Great Northern Railroad, which used his portraiture as commercial advertisement for the railroad and tourism. I came to find out that tuition to the school was waived for members of the Blackfoot tribe and a number of native artists came through the school including Albert Racine, Isabelle McKay, Stanley Croff and Victor Pepion. 

It is a great feeling to go into an exhibit of an artist you have never heard of and find a way to connect with them through unexpected ways. Seemingly, you would think that would happen every time. It doesn’t. It is the job of the curators to lift up entry points into an artist’s life and make it relevant to the viewers. I did not expect my time in the wilderness to connect to an immigrant artist from Germany in the early 20th century right in the heart of New York City. But, there it was, another inescapable pattern I recognize in myself and these artists, warring with themselves seeking wildness within and pulled towards the vibrancy of urban life, often making both happen over time.

More Reading: 

Review in The GuardianThe Art of Winold ReissA New Deal for Native Art 

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