Female Tattooed -- CARLI Digital Collections Featured Image

When I saw this image it reminded me of Ginevra de'Benci by Leonardo da Vinci 300 years earlier. In particular, Female Tattooed reprises the three-quarter pose and the outdoor background.

The British artist William Alexander is more known for traveling to China and his portrayals of Chinese people and scenes. According to Wikipedia, his illustrations for A Voyage of Discovery to the North Pacific Ocean (for which this watercolor drawing was made) were from someone else's sketches -- he didn't travel there himself.

I recognize the woman's chin tattoo from the tv show Hell on Wheels. The show is about construction of the transcontinental railroad during the post-Civil War reconstruction era. The show has a character named Eva, a white woman who was kidnapped by Indians as a child. She was sold by one tribe to another, and her chin tattoo is a record of the price paid for her. This woman's tattoo is a little different from Eva's so I wonder what it means.

Another thing that I wonder about this image is the single bared breast. Is it a concession toward European modesty or European eroticism of Native American women. Or is it simply accurate?

Kudos to the digital collection creators for the high quality metadata supplied for these wonderful images.

Written by Mary Rose, Metadata Librarian, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville

For more information about this and other CARLI Digital Collections, visit http://collections.carli.illinois.edu

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