Edward Curtis spent thirty years and what would now be hundreds of millions of dollars photographing a version of America he believed was vanishing. The result, The North American Indian, was never finished the way he imagined it — only around 257 of a planned 500 sets were ever produced, and just 157 survive intact today. This is one of them.
What sets this copy apart is not only its rarity but its clarity. Specialists describing the portrait of Bear's Belly note the three-dimensional precision of the sitter's gaze, the texture of his fur garment rendered with a sharpness that feels impossibly contemporary for a photograph made over a century ago. The set also carries a second American story: it was once owned by Andrew and Betsy Wyeth, with Andrew trading two of his own watercolors to acquire it. Two masters of American realism, a century apart, drawn to the same haunted, beautiful country.
This complete set will be on offer in Fine Books and Manuscripts, including Americana, with the live auction taking place 25 June in New York.
