Lot Essay
In her dissertation on John Mix Stanley, Dr. Schimmel suggests the possibility that this portrait, although not dated nor titled, was likely produced in 1843 at the time of the Tehaucana Creek Council and may depict Jesse Chisholm, an important Indian interpreter in Texas. Similarities in style, size, and materials used between this work and Jim Shaw, Delaware are too great to be discounted. Furthermore "in a letter of May 31, 1943 describing the Tehaucana Council Stanley remarked that he had painted Jim Shaw, 'Jess Chim' and 'Sanches'". (J.A. Schimmel, p. 40.) Mary S. Carnahan, the co-author of German Artist on the Texas frontier--Friedrich Richard Petri, who has also researched the subject, supports this theory, by comparing and noting similarities in physical appearance between different visual images of Chisholm.
Although the identification of this portrait has not been fully established, it is quite possible that it depicts Jesse Chisholm, who was the son of a Scot father and a Cherokee mother. Chisholm had met Sam Houston, the President of the Republic of Texas, early on in childhood while living in eastern Tennessee. Houston relied greatly on Chisholm as an interpreter much as he did on Jim Shaw. However, after establishing a lucrative trading business, Chisholm began to refuse the work as an interpreter due to its meager remuneration.
In this small oil study, Stanley demontrates an adeptness in capturing the sitter's acute facial features as well a sense of the Indian's introspective nature. Stanley articulates the gaze of the sitter's eyes, the angularity of his bone structure and the sharp edge of his metal shield with clarity and definition while the remaining areas are treated with a hastiness more typical of a small oil sketch.
Despite the uncertainty of the identification of the sitter, the piece possesses great value as a document of early Indian portraiture as well as a visual record of one of the Indian representatives at the Tehaucana Creek Council in Texas in March of 1843, where it was almost most likely executed.
Although the identification of this portrait has not been fully established, it is quite possible that it depicts Jesse Chisholm, who was the son of a Scot father and a Cherokee mother. Chisholm had met Sam Houston, the President of the Republic of Texas, early on in childhood while living in eastern Tennessee. Houston relied greatly on Chisholm as an interpreter much as he did on Jim Shaw. However, after establishing a lucrative trading business, Chisholm began to refuse the work as an interpreter due to its meager remuneration.
In this small oil study, Stanley demontrates an adeptness in capturing the sitter's acute facial features as well a sense of the Indian's introspective nature. Stanley articulates the gaze of the sitter's eyes, the angularity of his bone structure and the sharp edge of his metal shield with clarity and definition while the remaining areas are treated with a hastiness more typical of a small oil sketch.
Despite the uncertainty of the identification of the sitter, the piece possesses great value as a document of early Indian portraiture as well as a visual record of one of the Indian representatives at the Tehaucana Creek Council in Texas in March of 1843, where it was almost most likely executed.