Portrait and art photographer, Gertrude Stanton Kasebier (1852-1934) was raised in the Plains territory of Iowa and Colorado until a teenager. She was educated at the Moravian College for Women in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Later, she moved to New York City with her mother, and married Edward Kasebier in 1873, with whom she had three children. In 1888, Kasebier enrolled in the Pratt Institute to study painting and photography. She explored the creative and technical aspects of photography at the time, studied in France and Germany, and opened her first professional studio in 1898. Her photographs were published widely in Alfred Stieglitz's Camera Work and notable photographic magazines of the times. Kasebier's photographs of Native Americans in the Photographic History Collection, National Museum of American History, represent simple, yet artistic, portraits of Indians traveling with Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show and reservations of the Dakota Sioux. Her fond memories of playing with Indian children during her youth led her to write to the William F. Cody requesting to photograph Indians performing in his show at Madison Square Garden in 1898. Nine Indians were selected to be photographed. Her studio had no elaborate backdrops. Her photographs proved poignant. She removed Indian regalia from her subjects to depict the Indians as "raw" individuals, with strong personalities and experiences blurred between traditional life and contemporary times. Kasebier developed long relationships with several of the Wild West Show's Indians corresponding with a few, like Samuel Lone Bear, from 1898 to 1912. The Smithsonian's collection also includes drawings done by Indians waiting in her studio, photography of Dakota Sioux on the reservation, and portraits of Zitkala-Sa, also known as Gertrude Simmons Bonnin, a writer, violinist and Indian rights activist, all donated by her granddaughter Mina Turner in 1969.   Search Gertrude Kasebier Collection Enter Keyword