Beschreibung:

Color plates from the best travel book of the American West Karl Bodmer 1840-1843 BODMER, Karl (1809-1893) – MAXIMILIAN ZU WIED-NEUWIED, Prince Alexander (1782-1867). [ Travels in the Interior of North America. London: Ackermann and Co.; Paris: Arthus Bertrand; Koblenz: J. Hölscher, 1840-1843.] A nearly complete run of plates from the best illustrated travel book of the American West, with contemporary hand-coloring and in near fine condition. Karl Bodmer a Swiss artist then in his early twenties, was employed by the scientist Prince Maximilian to record his travels among the American tribes of the Plains, reaching as far west as Fort Mackenzie and the Blackfoot tribe of Montana. On their return to Europe, “Maximillian finally realized that, in his careful observations and hundreds of exotic watercolors and sketches Bodmer created, he possessed a priceless cache of ethnographic and historical information that would add much to the scientific literature about North America, and he set about producing one of the last of the great illustrated books of the Enlightenment as well as a thoroughly romantic document of his North American expedition” (Tyler, “Karl Bodmer and the American West,” in Ruud). Bodmer's plates depict the scenery, villages, dances and, most outstandingly, the hand-colored portraits of individuals from various tribes: his portrait of Pehriska-Rupha, the “Moennitarri warrior in the costume of the Dog danse,” is one of the greatest icons of a vanished way of life. These were also the first accurate depictions of Native Americans to reach the larger public. Abbey Travel 615 (English ed.); Howes M-443; B.K. Ruud, ed., Karl Bodmer's North American Prints (2004), pp. 77-321; Wagner-Camp 76:2. Broadsheets (each approx. 590 x 423mm). 79 (of 81) colored aquatint plates, many with additional hand-coloring heightened with gum arabic, comprising 47 “tableaux” (lacking no. 22, “Fac-simile of an Indian Painting”), and 32 “vignettes” (lacking no. 32, “Cleveland Lighthouse on the Lake Erie”); by various engravers, all bearing the Bodmer stamp, and all but three plates in states 1 or 2 (i.e., with trilingual captions but before the imprints were dated) (small pinprick thread holes on long edge of most plates, very light toning and spotting on a few plates; paper repairs to four plates not affecting image area). Overall a bright, lovely set.