using artists for documentation

[jbg]

What is the general opinion among this forums posters regarding using certain artists, like Robert Griffing or Don Troiani, to document clothing and accoutrements? My use of these 2 gentlemen is only because they seem to be the best known historical artists out there. I know they are both widely respected. Is there a consensus that if it is depicted in one of their paintings that you can rely on the weapons, clothing and accoutrements as being correct?

 

[mikee51848]

I think it's been said the most reliable descriptions of dress came from deserters. I can't vouch for the work of these fellows. I did notice, for example, the foot-wear in Troiani's depiction of a minute man had two variations. On the Fugawee home page, he's seen wearing ankle boots, but on Troiani's web site, the man is wearing buckle shoes. :hmm:

 

[Claude Mathis]

Here's a previous discussion...
[url] http://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/180621[/url]

 

[Gary]

Funny, but the same question was raised with regards to designs on ancient pottery. Artists have always had an artistic license and art cannot be taken as conclusive evidence.

 

[Wayne Combs]

I'll ask this:Would you use a Hollywood movie as documentation?Those director types,using the term loosely,call theirselves artists. :haha: Wayne.

 

I doubt Miller, Catlin or Bodmer had a political agenda to sell like Hollyweird does.
Art and surviving specimens and primary source documents are the best we have for pre-camera days. If you rely on only one of the 3 you get a jaded picture. Even with the 3 we don't get a total picture. What we need is a reliable time machine. :winking:

 

Don,

I remember reading somewhere that Miller reportedly once said about Stewart when he was finishing up paintings at Murthley. It was something like Stewart didn't want him to paint a single Indian that didn't carry himself well and command respect. Wish I had the actual citation. Anyway, I think using PERIOD artists along with things like original written accounts and trade records is as good as it gets. Using modern artists is dicey. I'm not talking about any of the people you mention here. But an artist may or may not do their homework before creating a painting. Either way, I can't say I've ever seen a painting with a bibliography included. That said, I've seen some very PC modern paintings.

Sean

 

[jbg]

And in Troiani's book he is wearing ankle boots.

What started my post was a discussion I had with a Civil War reenactor about a painting that was on the cover of North and South magazine several years ago. The scene depicts Confederate soldiers in battle, some wearing shirts and no jackets, at least 2 wearng bandanas on their head, and all the soldiers were firing 3 band Enfields with blued barrels. The painting was done by a veteran of that particular battle. My fellow reenactor argued that there was no way that could be true because the painting was so "inaccurate". He feels that if the artist was indeed a veteran, then he must have forgotten most of what he saw and experienced.
As far as using a Hollywood movie as documentation, we can pick apart any movie out there, even the good ones. Remember the scene in Man in the Wilderness, where one of the guys left with Richard Harris is holding a flintlock weapon, with no flint in the lock? And I am frightened by the amount of people I have spoken with who think that Oliver Stone's JFK is true.

 

[Claude Mathis]

I doubt Miller, Catlin or Bodmer had a political agenda to sell like Hollyweird does.

I agree. The best chance we have for accuracy is the artist who actually went into the field and painted what he saw.

Many modern artists paint romanticized depiction's of what they want history to have been. Even some artists of the 18th and 19th centuries never saw the actual scenes they depicted. They painted from here-say and written descriptions.

I think even back then, artists would rely on their contemporaries for content, copying what the public wanted to see. Just like movies today, once a film becomes popular, it's followed by copycats in the same genre.

I took the term "artist" in the original question to mean artist's from the time period in question. I would never include Hollywood in a discussion regarding history, as depicted through art.

(that's about 2 cents worth)

 

I think we have discussed this before, but artistic license is a reality now and was then. I have seen the exact same drawing from the 18th cent (copied several times by others) used to depict three totaly different Indian peoples in different contexts--so much for period art as the final arbiter of period stuff! On the other hand it is often all we have and commonly it is pretty good. Modern artists often use reenactor subjects and their art is only as historical as the reenactor is...some do alot of research I am told, however.