Paul kane's trip to the northwest.

1845, 17 In June, Kane set out along the five coastlines of Hubei Province and first arrived in the first ethnic area of Suojin. After painting for a few weeks, he went to Susan Marie between Lake Superior and Lake Huron. He had planned to go further, but John Ballenden, an experienced senior employee of Hudson's Bay Company, told him that the journey ahead was more arduous and desolate, and he would encounter many difficulties when crossing the western region alone, and suggested that he carry out this plan with the support of the company. 182 1 year, Hudson's Bay Company defeated its competitor, Northwest Montreal Company, and monopolized the fur trade in a large desert area from the Pacific Ocean to Oregon in the west of the Great Lakes, which has hundreds of scattered settlements. In winter, Kane returned to Toronto and moved the sketch material into the oil painting. The following spring, he visited the headquarters of Hudson's Bay Company in Racine (now part of Montreal), hoping that george simpson, the head of the company, would support his travel plan. Simpson was moved by the artistry of Kane's works, but he didn't go on a business trip with him to buy fur. He allowed Kane to ride in the company canoe until the end of Lake Winnipeg, and then decided whether to fund the whole trip according to his work progress. At the same time, he entrusted Kane to draw a seal for him. On May 9, 0846, Kane set out from Toronto by boat and went to Su Saint Mary to join the canoe team. But one night, the ship stopped at the shore and set out ahead of schedule the next morning. Kane missed the time and had to catch the ship by canoe. When he arrived at St. Mary's, the canoe caravan had already left, so he had to sail to Fort William in Sander Bay alone. On May 24th, he finally caught up with the canoe team on the Stikwa River in Camini, 35km away from Williamsburg.

On June 4, Kane arrived in Fort Francis and got Simpson's permission to move on. His next stop was the Red River settlement (near Winnipeg today). There, he went on a three-week riding and hiking trip, joined the Mestizo Bison Hunting Team and arrived in the Dakota Sioux area. On June 26, Kane witnessed and participated in a large-scale hunting of bison. In the following decades, the species was hunted in batches and almost extinct. After that, Kane continued his canoe trip, passing Norwegian House and arriving at Carletonburg along saskatchewan river. Then, he rode to Fort Edmonton to watch the Cree hunt bison.

On June 6th 1846, 10 Kane left Edmonton Castle for Boyne Castle in Asini, and on June 3rd 165438 he arrived in Jasper with the canoe team along the Assabasca River. He joined a huge cavalry team and prepared to head west. However, due to the deep snow in athabasca Pass, they had to send their horses back to Jasper and walk in snowshoes instead. 165438+1October 12 They crossed the mountain pass, joined a fleet three days later and went down the Columbia River. 1846, 1846 On February 8, 1946, Kane finally arrived at Fort Vancouver, the regional headquarters of Hudson Bay Company in Oregon. Kane spent the whole winter there, recording the life of Chinook and other ethnic groups nearby. During this period, he also made several short trips, including a three-week hike through the Willamette Valley. He likes life in Fort Vancouver very much and makes friends with Canadian explorer Peter skeen Ogden.

1On March 25th, 847, Kane started a new journey to Fort Victoria. 1846 Oregon Treaty stipulates that the Rocky Mountains should be 49 degrees north latitude as the border between Canada and the United States. Kane went up the Coles River, lived with local aborigines near Mount St. hellens for a week, then rode to Nisco Leigh (today's Tacoma) and took a boat to Fort Victoria. He spent two months in the area between vancouver island and Juan de Fuca Strait and strait of georgia, and drew many sketches about the life of Native Americans. Kane returned to Vancouver in mid-June and set off for the East in July 1. Kane arrived in Fort Valavaara in mid-July. He also made a detour to visit Whitman Church, where the Whitman Massacre took place a few months later. He visited the Kayu Serb residence with Max wittman. He even painted a portrait of Thomas Hans, who was the murderer of the Whitman family. It is recorded in Kane's Travels that the relationship between Kayu Serbs and the founders of the church was not very harmonious at that time.

Guided by a guide, Kane rode through Dagiri to Fort colville, where he stayed for six weeks, describing the life of the local people. It's salmon spawning season, and he also participated in a fishing camp for local residents at the lower reaches of keitel Falls. 1On September 22nd, 847, Kane joined a canoe fleet upstream along the Columbia River, and arrived at Port Camp on June 22nd, 10. There, they had to stop for three weeks, waiting for the arrival of cavalry from Jasper. After that, they took turns to work. The cavalry turned and drove down the Columbia River in a canoe, while the people of Kane's fleet rode on to athabasca Pass with their goods. Despite the low temperature and deep snow, they managed to bring all the horses back to Jasper. However, the boat waiting for them in Jasper had already left, so they had to wear snowshoes and walk to Boynburg, Asini with dogs and sledges. The journey was extremely difficult, and even food was scarce in the last two weeks. After a short rest in Boynburg, Asini for a few days, they went on to Fort Edmonton, where they spent the winter.

Kane once again participated in the buffalo hunting in Fort Edmonton and drew many sketches for the nearby Cree people. 1848 65438+ 10, he made a short trip to Fort Pitt, 200 miles downstream of saskatchewan river, and then returned to Fort Edmonton. In April, he went to the house in the Rocky Mountains, hoping to see Blackfoot, but he was disappointed. Kane wrote a lot of works in his life. He created more than 700 sketches during his two voyages to the West, and then created more than 65,438+000 oil paintings in Toronto's studio. John Harper commented on the portraits of York and Coburg before Kane's trip. "They are simple, but very infectious. The use of warm colors makes them more attractive. " However, the number of works he created as a mobile portrait painter in the United States and the number of works copied by masters during his study tour in Europe are unknown.

Kane is famous for describing the life of Native Americans. His sketches are rich, including pencils, watercolors and oil paints. He also brought back various artworks collected during his trip, including masks and other handicrafts. These are the foundations of his later studio works, and he combined these materials into large-scale oil paintings. His sketches are very valuable materials for the study of ethnology, while oil paintings vividly describe the life of Native Americans, but because they are recreated, they cannot be used as direct reference evidence for the study of geography, history and ethnology.

"Flat-headed Women and Children" is an example of Kane's re-creation technique. In one sketch, he flattened the head of a Chinook child, put it in a cradle, and combined it with another sketch drawn in other areas. The Indian camp on Lake Huron is mainly based on the sketch of his first visit to St. Mary's Church in 1845. In oil painting, he added unique romantic skills, emphasizing light and dreamy clouds. The camping life depicted in the painting is like a nostalgic version of the idealized pastoral life in Europe. The main technique of Kane's painting is the classic European style. For economic reasons, his works are relatively simple. He needs to sell these paintings to make a living. The clients he knows are very kind to him. His clients don't want to decorate their homes by copying sketches and oil paintings directly. They wanted those paintings to be more beautiful and closer to the style of most popular European works at that time.

In Kane's painting 12 "Asini Boyne Hunting Buffalo in Asini" for Congress, the intention of this decoration is very obvious. The horse in the painting is more like an Arabian horse than an Indian horse, so this painting has been criticized. The composition of this painting is based on an Italian sculpture of 18 16, which shows two Romans hunting bulls. In 1877, Nicholas flood Davin pointed out the difference between them. "Indian horses are Greek horses, and the colors of hills are like early European landscapes." Lawrence J. Bobby pointed out when reprinting Kane's Travels in 1925, "Sketch reflects the real and primitive life in the west, which is priceless to art in some aspects." Kane is regarded as the most important artist in Canada. At present, there are still 1 1 oil paintings he created for Congress, and 1955 paintings are collected by the National Gallery of Canada. A large number of works collected by Ellen were purchased by Edmund Boyd osler in 1903 and donated to the Royal Ontario Museum in 19 12. 1957, paul kane Jr, Kane's grandson, sold 229 sketches of Kane to the Stark Art Museum for $65,438+million.

His portrait of john henry Lefroy, a British surveyor, was collected by the Lefroy family in Britain and sold by Canadian billionaire Kenneth thomson at an auction held at Sotheby's in Toronto on February 5, 2002, setting a record of 5 million Canadian dollars. Thomson donated this painting to the Ontario Museum of Art as part of his collection. The Grimborg Museum in Calgary has a copy of this painting, which is believed to have been made by Kane's wife, harriet Cherin. On October 22nd, 2004, Sotheby's auction house auctioned another oil painting by Kane, Encampment, Winnipeg River, and only sold 6,543,800+0.7 million Canadian dollars, which failed to reach the expected 2.5 million Canadian dollars. Kane's Travels, 1859, was first published in London and reprinted several times in the 20th century. 1986 Dawkins thinks that Kane's works are mainly based on his travel notes, but his oil paintings reflect imperialism and even racial prejudice. This view is not unique among art historians. Kane's original travel notes did not contain any contemptuous judgments. McClaren thinks that the style of Kane's notes is very different from the published writing style, so this book is likely to be greatly revised or even rewritten into the popular Victorian travel style when it is published, so it is hard to say that the artist himself is racially biased.