Charles Christian Nahl, The Fandango
Nahl’s painting of life in Hispanic San Francisco was executed many years after the old culture was fast disappearing in California. Nahl had witnessed the disappearance first-hand, and was determined to rescue what he could in the format of a large genre oil painting. Here we see a vaquero roping a bull (and a young boy imitating him by roping a dog), musicians (one perhaps a Gypsy, another an African-American), a knife-fight and of course a fandango. The red kerchief in the male dancer’s rear pocket indicates that he is ready and willing to dance.
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The Fandango (detail)
Gaiety and violence, romance and stolid observance (the Native American wearing a serape and smoking a cigar) — a composite scene of incidents in the life of Hispanic California.
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The Great Bull and Bear Fight
“October 23rd. Today, the governor had prepared for us an interesting spectacle: a fight between a bull and a bear. The latter here are so numerous that you have only to go a mile from the habitations into the woods to meet them in great numbers… The dragoons are sent on horseback into the forest for a bear as we would order a cook to bring a goose from a pen.
“Three dragoons on horseback, provided only with a noose, are sufficient to overpower a bear. In this kind of chase, they endeavor always to keep him in the middle, and to provoke him. As soon as the furious animal is going to rush on one of the horsemen, the other throws the noose, which is fastened to the saddle by strong thongs, round the bear’s foreleg, and spurs his horse, by which the bear is thrown down. The other dragoon takes advantage of this moment and throws his noose around the bear’s hind leg; and while he lies unable to move, the third dragoon ties all four feet together, and the bear is thus carried home without any danger.
“In this manner, the dragoons had brought a bear today, while others had caught a wild bull in the same mode. The combat between the two animals was remarkable; and though the bull often tossed his raging antagonist on his horns into the air, he was at last obliged to yield.” — Otto von Kotzebue
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End of the Trail
In 1857, Charles Christian Nahl painted this California Native American seated by the Sacramento. He is surrounded by domesticated animals — just as the sitter has been “domesticated,” shown wearing European clothes and evincing a calm acceptance of his fate.
In 1915, at San Francisco’s Panama Pacific International Exposition, James Earle Fraser exhibited this poignant sculpture, End of the Trail, depicting the demoralized spirit of Native Americans following their defeat and exile onto the reservations:
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