Tableau of Indian Faces

John Lewis Krimmel

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In 1809 Krimmel immigrated to Philadelphia, where he trained as an artist. In 1812 he was commissioned by Pavel Petrovich Svinin to create fourteen watercolors for Svinin’s travel account "A Picturesque Voyage in North America" (1815). An engraving after this watercolor prefaces the chapter on American Indians. Like Svinin, Krimmel probably never observed any American Indians from life. Many of the likenesses that crowd this composition are borrowed from works by Benjamin West, most notably "The Death of General Wolfe" (1770; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa) and "William Penn’s Treaty with the Indians" (1771–72; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts). Krimmel was also inspired by the montage-like format of William Hogarth’s print "Characters and Caricaturas" (1743).

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art