"Knife River Spring"

Early 1800s

Awatixa Hidatsa Village

Limited Edition Print, 18" x 24"

$ 130

A young Hidatsa woman has pulled her bullboat onto the east bank of the Knife River as dawn's light bathes the earth lodges of her Hidatsa village in what is now central North Dakota. It is still Mapi'-o'ce-mi'di, or Sunflower-Planting-Moon and the day begins early for there is much to do. The prairie is beginning to green and the People have just returned to their spacious earth lodges on the terraces after spending the winter in their smaller lodges sheltered in the river bottoms.

She waits as her elder follows in a second bullboat. The two women will gather stakes for use in their gardens as well as firewood for the lodges. Sunflowers will be the first seeds sown and will be the last to be harvested in the fall. As early spring is a harbinger of change, so too is the scene depicted here. Within a few short decades the Hidatsa's traditional way of life: well-order, spiritual and familial, will be disrupted irreparably.

My particular thanks to the members of the Three Affiliated Tribes, the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara for providing help, counsel and expertise to allow my creation of this painting.

"Bank Robbery, 1866"

Limited Edition Print, 18" x 25"

$150

When the Civil War ended, footloose, restless men moved west. The unprecedented availability of inexpensive weapons and battle-hardened men made lethal confrontations frequent . I wished to depict that frantic and uncertain moment when desperadoes, having just held up a frontier bank, have reached their horses and are mounting. That moment of transition between running swiftly on foot and racing off on horseback has to be performed smoothly and quickly. A lost stirrup, a dropped rein, a spinning horse: all these could be the difference between life and death. The last man from the bank is mounting his startled horse as his pards wheel to return the fire from irate and determined bank employees and townsmen.