EDMONIA LEWIS (ca. 1844-1907)
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Hiawatha's Marriage1868
Marble |
ARTWORK
A youthful couple strides forward, holding hands, gazing into one another’s eyes. We can identify their traditional Native American headdresses, jewelry, clothing, moccasins, and a quiver of arrows. Upon closer examination, the title of the piece is inscribed on the base, Hiawatha’s Marriage. This sculptural group is based upon Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem, The Song of Hiawatha, published in 1855. It depicts the hero of the poem, Hiawatha, and his bride Minnehaha. Their marriage sealed a pact of peace between Hiawatha’s tribe, the Ojibwa, and Minnehaha’s tribe, the Dakota.
ART HISTORY
Eighteenth and nineteenth-century figurative marble sculpture is one of the defining artistic legacies of ancient Greece and Rome. In this sense, the Marriage of Hiawatha is described as a neoclassic work, that is, the material and the composition reflect the heritage of Greek and Roman classicism. At the same time the work is romantic. The specificity of attributes that identify the figures as Native American (therefore exotic), together with the emphasis on the couple’s tender feelings for one another as they marry, convey the romantic style’s focus on emotional depth and complexity. In the mid-19th century, combining the styles of the classical world and romantic expression was typical in art.
ARTIST
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The American sculptor Edmonia Lewis was the daughter of a Native American mother and African American father. She was raised chiefly within her mother’s tribe, and attended Oberlin College in Ohio, the first American college to admit women. She was around twenty-one in 1865 when President Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves in the South near the end of the Civil War. Lewis left Oberlin in 1863 to study sculpture in Boston, and in 1866 she established a studio in Rome, a city famous for its ancient marble sculpture where the material was still readily available. Many tourists visited her studio, and the eyes of the art world were on this young African American artist.
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CONNECTIONS
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote the romantic epic poem The Song of Hiawatha which inspired many artists in the mid-19th century, and the works found great favor with the art-buying public. Lewis created multiple figure groups and marble busts of the characters described by Longfellow. Below are some of the verses surrounding Hiawatha’s wedding.
Onaway! Awake, beloved!
Thou the wild-flower of the forest!
Thou the wild-bird of the prairie!
Thou with eyes so soft and fawn-like!
If thou only lookest at me,
I am happy, I am happy,
As the lilies of the prairie,
When they feel the dew upon them!
Onaway! Awake, beloved!
Thou the wild-flower of the forest!
Thou the wild-bird of the prairie!
Thou with eyes so soft and fawn-like!
If thou only lookest at me,
I am happy, I am happy,
As the lilies of the prairie,
When they feel the dew upon them!
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Edmonia Lewis, Forever Free, 1867, marble; Edmonia Lewis, Hiawatha’s Marriage, 1868, marble, Cappy Thompson, Lovers Sweet Embrace While Dream Chariot Awaits, 1997.
ART CONNECTIONS
On the left is Forever Free, 1867 (Howard University) another figural group by Edmonia Lewis celebrating the emancipation of the slaves. A woman kneels and prays in thanksgiving, alongside a man as he raises the chains that once bound him.
Another scene of romantic love in the MMFA’s collection is found on Cappy Thompson’s glass vessel Lovers Sweet Embrace While Dream Chariot Awaits, 1997. A seated couple hugs and kisses good night as their dog sleeps peacefully at their feet. In Lewis’s sculpture, Hiawatha is depicted formally on his wedding day, but Cappy Thompson’s vessel shows a casual, everyday scene. Lewis carved her work in marble with stone-working tools, while Thompson painted this bright scene on the inside of blown glass vessel.
Another scene of romantic love in the MMFA’s collection is found on Cappy Thompson’s glass vessel Lovers Sweet Embrace While Dream Chariot Awaits, 1997. A seated couple hugs and kisses good night as their dog sleeps peacefully at their feet. In Lewis’s sculpture, Hiawatha is depicted formally on his wedding day, but Cappy Thompson’s vessel shows a casual, everyday scene. Lewis carved her work in marble with stone-working tools, while Thompson painted this bright scene on the inside of blown glass vessel.
DISCUSSION
This work represents an idealized, 19th-century interpretation of a marriage between two Native Americans in the 15th-century. Do you think that Lewis believed the clothing and accessories she used were accurate for showing 15th-century Native Americans? Would that have been important to her? If so, why? If not, why not? How do you think an actual “marriage” between Native Americans prior to the 19th century would have differed from what is shown here? Can you find information on the marriage customs of the Native American tribes prior to when the sculpture was made? What is the sculpture made of? How are Hiawatha and Minnehaha interacting with one another? How do you think they feel about each other?