Beside The Big River: Images and Art of the
Mid-Columbia Indians
July 16 – November 15, 2011
Beside the Big River: Images and Art of the Mid-Columbia Indians centers around a series of photographs by Lee Moorhouse, Thomas Rutter and J.W. Thompson depicting regional Indian life along with selected examples of Indian art.
Klickitat, Wedding Veil, c. 1875, glass and metal beads, dentalium shells, thimbles, bells and Chinese coins, 22" x 10". Acc. No. 1989.13.001, Maryhill Museum of Art.
The Middle Columbia River region extends down river nearly 200 miles from the mouth of the Snake River to present-day Bonneville Dam. Celebrated for their unique stone, wood, horn and bone carvings, for basketry, and for their bead work, the Mid-Columbia Indians who lived along this expanse of river figured prominently in the writings of 19th-century explorers and early pioneers.
During the 20th century, these same peoples were photographed by regional photographers. Between 1900 and the late 1950s, three of them—Lee Moorhouse of Pendleton, Oregon, Thomas H. Rutter of Yakima, Washington, and J.W. Thompson of Seattle, Washington—captured nearly 6,000 images of Indian life along the Middle Columbia River. They also photographed Columbia River peoples who were relocated to communities on the nearby Yakama, Warm Springs and Umatilla Indian Reservations.
Beside the Big River: Images and Art of the Mid-Columbia Indians presents 40 Moorhouse, Rutter and Thompson photographs of regional Indian life, and select examples of Indian art worked in a variety of mediums.