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Art spotlight: Edward Curtis | StarTribune.com

Art spotlight: Edward Curtis

Updated: March 28, 2013 - 2:22 PM

BEAUTY HEART AND SPIRIT: EDWARD CURTIS AND THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIAN

Continuing: In the early 1900s, Wisconsin-born Edward S. Curtis embarked on an improbable effort to photograph all the Indian tribes of North America. By 1930 he had taken more than 40,000 images of 80 tribes, published 20 volumes containing more than 2,200 images, and recorded 10,000 wax cylinders of tribal languages and music as well as extensive film footage.

Curtis grew up in Minnesota and apprenticed as a photographer in St. Paul before moving to Seattle, where he became one of the city’s leading photographers. There’s a romantic nobility to his sepia-toned portraits of Indians and the still-unspoiled plains, mountains and buttes that once supported their traditional way of life. His 1908 portrait “Bear’s Belly — Arikara” is shown here.

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Eighty of Curtis’ images — including vintage prints and contemporary reproductions — are on loan from Christopher Cardozo Fine Art, which is also providing 20 prints for an auction and lottery to support photography education for disadvantaged kids.

(Auction and lottery, 6:30 p.m. April 19, $25. Mpls Photo Center, 2400 N. 2nd St., Mpls. Show ends April 28. Free. 612-424-8359 or Mpls Photo Center)

Mary Abbe