Nov 21, 2024 - Sale 2687

Sale 2687 - Lot 13

Price Realized: $ 812
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
(AMERICAN INDIANS--PHOTOGRAPHY.) Mathew Brady. Cabinet card portraits of the Ute chief Ouray and his wife Chepeta. Albumen photographs, about 6 x 4 inches, on original photographer's mounts, captioned with inked stamps in lower margins; minor foxing. Washington: Brady's National Portrait Gallery, [January 1880]

Additional Details

Ouray was chief of the Uncompahgre Utes in Colorado. In 1879, a different group of Utes attacked their Indian Agency and killed ten in the Meeker Massacre. Ouray and his wife Chepeta went east to negotiate a solution to the ongoing tensions, arriving in Washington to great fanfare on 11 January 1880. The visit resulted in Ute reservations in Colorado and Utah.

Mathew Brady was the most famous American photographer of the 19th century, but his fame rested on portraits of Abraham Lincoln's circle and Civil War scenes. We have not handled any other American Indian portraits by him.