John Gast, American Progress

John Gast, American Progress, 12.75 x 16.75 inches, 1872

A student recently recommended a link to the Indian Land Tenure Foundation where a painting by Charles Hilliard called Reversing Manifest Destiny is reproduced on items that support the foundation’s mission. https://iltf.org/get-involved/

I found this image a powerful counter narrative to John Gast’s painting that is the subject of this unit’s Critical Thinking Assignment.

Now, I’ve just read about Wendy Red Star’s installation at Stanford University where the Apsalooke (Crow) artist is ‘reimagining’ every part of Gast’s painting! It is a remarkable counter commentary on the 19th-century image of manifest destiny. I highly recommend reading the article which you can find here:

https://www.artnews.com/art-news/artists/wendy-red-star-stanford-university-exhibition-1234626253/#recipient_hashed=a33eb6c39d8782dc226bdf04043182cfce78a2c0e0803690b953201ed61551c7&utm_medium=email&utm_source=exacttarget&utm_campaign=artnews_today&utm_content=346181_04-22-2022&utm_term=7999510

Here is yet another example of how learning to look and read visual symbols opens up new ways of seeing the world. We can compare how the image-making of the past as evident in Gast’s painting promoted a vision of westward expansion that was narrowly tied to the advancing interests of mostly white settlers. With Hilliard’s painting and the recent artworks produced by Wendy Red Star, we can see a transformation of image-making that tells a different narrative. Hilliard and Red Star make artistic decisions that revise Gast’s original message to reveal an alternative history.

Remember, history is not the past. History is a story about the past. And, history is closely aligned with who tells the story.

The assignment goals:
First, identify the figures in Gast’s painting. Analyze the placement and the scale of the figures as indicative of their roles in the meaning of the picture. How do light and shadow and color contribute to the emphasis and meaning of the figures? What can you say about the meaning of the figures? (One paragraph)

Second, identify the means of transportation and communication in Gast’s painting. In general, how does the placement, scale, and direction of these features contribute to the meaning of their meaning? (One paragraph)

Third, characterize the landscape background by writing about what features are evident and how they are rendered. Where is the light coming from and what might the light symbolize? (One paragraph)

Finally, this painting was commissioned by George Crofutt, the publisher of a popular series of western travel guides, who included this image as an engraving in his publications. What do you think readers of those guides would think of the West after seeing this image? What ideological message about Native Americans is communicated by the representation painted by Gast and published by Crofutt? (One paragraph)

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