Painted Tipi Curtain: Victory Record of the Elkhorn Scraper Warrior Society

Cheyenne · c. 1870

Medium

Bison hide, pigment, and stitching

Original size

223.6 × 240.1 cm (88 × 94 1/2 in.)

Currently held

Art Institute of Chicago

Movement

Realism

This painted tipi curtain stands as one of the most vivid surviving records of Cheyenne warrior culture — a richly detailed visual chronicle rendered directly onto bison hide with natural earth pigments. Created around 1870 by Cheyenne artists, the work documents the victories of the Elkhorn Scraper Warrior Society through a pictographic tradition in which military achievements were recorded with precision and communal pride. Unlike European academic painting, Plains pictographic art prioritised narrative clarity over illusionistic space — each figure, weapon, and horse is rendered to be read as information, not simply admired as image. The use of bison hide as a ground and stitching to join panels reflects both the materials available to nomadic peoples and the skilled craft traditions embedded in their daily life. The Art Institute of Chicago holds this work as part of its collection of Native North American art, where it is recognised as an exceptional example of pre-reservation Cheyenne pictorial tradition at a moment when such records carried enormous cultural weight. Our hand-painted oil reproduction translates the composition onto canvas with care for the original's palette, figural arrangement, and layered visual energy — bringing this remarkable document of warrior memory into a form that can be lived with and appreciated daily.