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Interior of the Best Indian Kitchen on the Crow Reservation

Richard Throssel Native American
1910
Not on view
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.
Richard Throssel, of Canadian Cree and English descent, lived on the Crow reservation in Montana from 1902 to 1911, when government-imposed standards for acculturation and sanitation were commonly imposed policies. Throssel produced this posed image and other health education slides for a nationwide U.S. government campaign to stop the spread of disease. Here, a Crow family is dining together in a tidy wallpapered room, with Euro-American style tableware and linens. However, Native American identity is projected through the woman’s traditional style dress, decorated with elk teeth.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Interior of the Best Indian Kitchen on the Crow Reservation
  • Artist: Richard Throssel (Native American, Cree (adopted Crow), 1882–1933)
  • Date: 1910
  • Geography: United States, Washington
  • Culture: Cree (adopted Crow)
  • Medium: Glass
  • Dimensions: 12 in. x 8 in. mounted
    6 1/2 in. x 8.5 in. original size
  • Classifications: Negatives, Glass
  • Credit Line: National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. (00486700)
  • Curatorial Department: The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing