Podcast Summary: The American West – Ep. 09: Catlin’s and Bodmer’s "Time Machine Visuals"

Host: Dan Flores
Guests: Stephen Randall, Randall (former student/interviewer)
Date: August 26, 2025

Overview of the Episode

This episode delves into the transformative works of two 19th-century painter-adventurers, George Catlin and Karl Bodmer, whose art created a "visual time machine" of the early American West. Dan Flores, with guests and former students, explores how their paintings not only documented Western landscapes, wildlife, and Native peoples, but also shaped how generations since have imagined and understood the pre-photographic frontier. The discussion moves from the personal passions and rivalries of these artists to complex debates on Romanticism, conservation, and the evolving legacy of Indigenous representation.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Personal Significance of Visual Records ([01:58]–[08:43])

• Flores starts with a vivid anecdote about his own backpacking trip in Glacier National Park, noting how his memories are mainly visual, captured in photos rather than words.
• He draws a parallel to how, lacking full sensory records, we rely on images—and how Catlin and Bodmer’s art fills that historical gap.
  • Quote: “Our best time machine for [the past] engages just one sense, the visual record.” (Dan Flores, [03:10])

2. George Catlin: The First Historian of the Indian ([08:43]–[20:13])

• Catlin's obsessive mission: To document Native Americans and western landscapes before they vanished, seeing himself as both historian and artist.
  • Quote: “Resolved, if my life should be spared by the aid of my brush and pen, to rescue from oblivion so much of the Indian's looks and customs as... one lifetime could accomplish.” (Catlin, as read by Dan Flores, [10:11])
• Name recognition and controversy: Catlin is well-known, but often misunderstood or even ridiculed by peers (e.g., “humbug”).
  • Miller, Audubon, and Bodmer criticized Catlin, sometimes out of jealousy.
  • Quote: “Bodmer actually advised European friends to avoid Catlin’s exhibition...” (Flores, [14:53])
• American Romanticism and its reflection in Catlin’s work.
  • Catlin saw the Great Plains as worthy of awe, diverging from the mountain-centric view of Romanticism.
  • Quote: “In 1832, George Catlin painted the curvaceous, shadow-filled plains as a soul-melting country to my eye, like a fairyland.” (Flores, [16:20])
• Conservation foresight: Catlin was the first to propose a “nation’s park” preserving not just nature and animals, but Native cultures as living entities.
  • Quote: “A nation's park containing man and beast in all the wild and freshness of their nature's beauty.” (Catlin, [18:27])
• Sympathetic outlook: Unlike most contemporaries, Catlin believed Indigenous people should “endure in America” and be admired, not erased.

3. Carl Bodmer: The Swiss Visual Chronicler ([22:14]–[34:24])

• Bodmer, though lesser known today, was an extraordinarily skilled artist who captured the Upper Missouri in 1833–34 with meticulous, realistic detail.
• His patron, Prince Maximilian, sought visual records of landscapes and Native peoples, bringing Bodmer as both landscape and figure painter.
• Constrast in method and legacy:
  • Bodmer was methodical, sometimes spending a whole day on one image, while Catlin worked rapidly.
  • His animal and landscape watercolors, such as View of the Bear Paw Mountains, are highlighted as unmatched records of the West before it changed forever.
  • Quote: “Bodmer’s view of the Bear Paw Mountains is one of the truest Western landscape paintings of all time.” (Flores, [29:12])
• Bodmer’s poignant documentation of the Mandan people became an accidental elegy, as most of the Mandans died in a smallpox epidemic soon after.
• Rediscovery: Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Bernard DeVoto and, later, Native communities and Hollywood, used Bodmer's work to reconnect with and more accurately represent the past.
  • Quote: “Descendants of the Indian peoples Bodmer once painted, then utilized his time machine visuals to help them recover their ancestors.” (Flores, [32:40])

4. Rivalries, Reputations, and the Power of Images ([36:37]–[51:16])

• Guests discuss how Catlin is both a “fountain of information” and a polarizing figure, often painted by his peers as a fraud—yet today seen as a foundational visual historian.
  • Quote: “Catlin was clearly a guy who was maybe a little too successful in winning over followers.” (Flores, [39:51])
• Catlin’s unique vision for parks included Native peoples and their cultures, unlike later U.S. policies which forcibly removed them from parklands.
  • Contrast with global examples (tribal/autonomous zones) where Indigenous self-governance persists within modern nations; Catlin’s proposal is seen in this context as radical.
  • Quote: “He does get credit for being the first person to ever propose [a national park] in America.” (Flores, [41:55])
• The reality (and danger) of viewing the past through limited imagery: Early European artists’ depictions were “grotesque” and off-putting, influencing popular perceptions until more authentic art like Catlin's and Bodmer's arrived.
  • Quote: “You’re really at the mercy... of one or two illustrators. It gets in your head that it looked that way...” (Randall, [48:38])

5. The Complexity of Enlightenment and Othering ([51:16]–[57:52])

• The hosts interrogate Catlin’s place on the spectrum of 19th-century thought regarding Indigenous peoples, noting that his stance—if paternalistic by modern standards—was radically progressive for his time.
  • Catlin even interviewed President Jackson, arguing against Indian removal, wanting Americans to “grow up around Native people” ([53:52]–[55:45]).
  • Quote: “Given the context of the time, this guy is a raging liberal trying to defend the rights of Native people in the 1830s.” (Flores, [57:50])
• Recognition that judgments on historic figures must be contextual—Catlin’s vision, though problematic today, emanated from rare sympathy and advocacy.

Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• Dan Flores on visual memory:
  “Our best time machine for [the past] engages just one sense, the visual record.” ([03:10])
• Catlin’s mission:
  “Resolved ... to rescue from oblivion so much of the Indian's looks and customs as... one lifetime could accomplish.” ([10:11])
• Romanticizing the Plains:
  “George Catlin painted the curvaceous, shadow-filled plains as a soul-melting country to my eye, like a fairyland.” ([16:20])
• Catlin's radical park proposal:
  “A nation's park containing man and beast in all the wild and freshness of their nature's beauty.” ([18:27])
• Peer sniping:
  “Bodmer actually advised European friends to avoid Catlin’s exhibition...” ([14:53])
• On Bodmer’s lasting impact:
  “Bodmer’s view of the Bear Paw Mountains is one of the truest Western landscape paintings of all time.” ([29:12])
• Modern use of Bodmer’s art:
  “Native people attempting to reacquire their cultures and especially Hollywood, trying... more realistically portray Native people. They turned to Bodmer.” ([47:36])
• Critical context for Catlin:
  “Given the context of the time, this guy is a raging liberal trying to defend the rights of Native people in the 1830s.” ([57:50])

Timeline of Important Segments

• [01:58]–[08:43]: Reflections on memory, sensory loss, and the power of images
• [08:43]–[20:13]: Catlin’s life, mission, Romanticism, and his controversial reception
• [22:14]–[34:24]: Bodmer’s journey, art, and legacy
• [36:37]–[51:16]: Roundtable on artistic rivalry, mythmaking, and visual authority
• [51:16]–[57:52]: The spectrum of belief about Indigenous peoples; Catlin’s radicalism in historical context

Episode Tone & Takeaways

The conversation is thoughtful, reflective, and reverent toward the West’s layered history and the medium of art as a bridge across time. With a blend of scholarly insight and accessible storytelling, the episode encourages listeners to reconsider old visual records not as mere artifacts, but as living conduits to lost worlds and debates that still resonate in contemporary discussions about conservation, representation, and national identity.

For more perspective:

• Explore Catlin’s Letters and Notes on the North American Indians
• View Carl Bodmer’s portfolio in art books or museums
• Consider how visual culture shapes our relationship with place and past