Edward S. Curtis

Florence Curtis Graybill and Victor Boesen, Visions of A Vanishing Race (Boston, 1976), pl. 2

Charles Fergus, 'Shifting Shadows,' Art & Antiques, November 1991, pp. 46-7 (alternate cropping)

Christopher Cardozo, ed., Native Nations (Boston, 1993), p. 30

Edward S. Curtis: The North American Indian, The Complete Portfolios (Köln, 1997), p. 58

Barbara A. Davis, Edward S. Curtis: The Life and Times of a Shadow Catcher (San Francisco, 1985), p. 244

Christopher Cardozo, ed., Sacred Legacy: Edward Curtis and the North American Indian (New York, 2000), p. 189

Timothy Egan, Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher: The Epic Life and Immortal Photographs of Edward Curtis (Boston, 2012), p. 158

Canyon de Chelly is one of Edward Curtis’ most recognizable and powerful photographs, taken in 1904 at a scared location in the heart of Navaho country. The massive scale of the ancient rock formations in comparison to the miniscule riders becomes even more imposing when the image is printed in a mural-sized format.

Clearly one of his favorite images, Curtis printed this negative in four different photographic processes: orotone, photogravure, platinum, and gelatin silver. While smaller prints of this image are relatively plentiful, there have been no oversized prints of this image to appear at auction.