Charles Christian Nahl
Charles Christian Nahl was born in Germany in 1818 to a family of artists. He studied in Kassel and Paris before his family joined the Gold Rush, arriving in California in 1851. After a brief time mining, Nahl focused on art, painting portraits of miners and making a visual record of the people, places, plants, and animals he encountered in the West. He went on to establish a studio in San Francisco and was one of the first painters to enjoy the patronage of wealthy Californians.
What does assimilation look like?
Nahl’s portrait presents a rare “fine art” depiction of culturally assimilated Native American man, a subject usually confined to ephemeral propaganda such as before-and-after photographs produced by social reformers. Dressed in a jacket and tie and shown outdoors with chickens and dogs, the sitter is awkwardly posed between two cultures and two identities. Today, this painting provides a counterpoint to the stereotypical images of Native Americans typically found in American museums.
Gift of Mrs. Milton S. Latham
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