Peter Rindisbacher
| Peter Rindisbacher | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Peter Rindisbacher 12 April 1806 Emmental, Canton of Berne, Switzerland |
| Died | 13 August 1834 (aged 28) St. Louis, Missouri, US |
| Nationality | American |
| Education | One year in a Swiss art school as a youth, but mostly Self-taught |
| Known for | Watercolor painting |
| Movement | Naïve Realism |
Peter Rindisbacher (12 April 1806 – 12 August or 13 August 1834) was a Swiss artist who specialized in watercolors and illustrations dealing with First Nation tribes of mid-Western Canada and the United States, mostly depictions of the Anishinaabe, Cree, and Sioux, usually in group action or genre scenes. He seldom did individual portraits; however, he painted himself into a few interior tipi scenes, usually smoking a pipe. He commonly referred to the tipis as tents, such as in the title, Inside a Skin Tent.
Rindisbacher emigrated from Switzerland to western Canada with his family when he was fifteen. The family was recruited by an agent of Red River Colony, established by the Earl of Selkirk, to settle the area located near present-day Winnipeg, Manitoba. Lord Selkirk's land grant, called Assiniboia, was administered by a governor and council but, as all the colony's officials had connections with the Hudson's Bay Company, the colony was effectively an arm of Hudson's Bay's operations. The colony faced difficulties due to a disastrous flood of the Red River, on the eastern boundary of North Dakota north to Lake Winnipeg, which led to damaged crops and starvation. The Rindisbacher family relocated to Wisconsin in 1826, and then settled permanently in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1829.
From the age of fifteen until his death, possibly of cholera, at age 28, Rindisbacher was a producing artist. He began working with charcoal as a young boy, with the encouragement of his father, and received one year of formal training with artist Jakob Samuel Weibel in Switzerland. He executed sketches and watercolors of his family's journey from Europe to western Canada, life and company officials in the Red River Colony, and Indians and animals in west-central Canada and the midwestern United States, including the Chippewa and Metis people living along the Red River Trails. At age twenty-three, upon moving to St. Louis, Rindisbacher established an artist's studio, where he also produced illustrations for magazines and book covers, and contributed to the History of the Indian Tribes of North America collection.
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