Buffalo Coat 1908

Charles Russell made this evocative oil painting called "Buffalo Coat." Look at the warm earth tones. You can almost feel the Montana sun beating down on the parched ground. I imagine Russell, brush in hand, outdoors, squinting as he tries to capture the right shade of ochre for the fort walls. It must have been tough, mixing paint, trying to get the right consistency, the dust swirling around... There's something so painterly in the way he captures the wood, the figure’s solemnity, the details in the clothing. It makes you wonder, what was it like back then? What did the West really look like? What was it like for this man, this culture? Painters like Russell, Remington, and Bierstadt, were all in conversation with each other, figuring out how to paint the American West. It's a reminder that paintings are never just about what they depict, but about how artists see and interpret the world around them. They invite us to see it with them, to imagine the past, and to reflect on the stories we tell ourselves about who we are.