HOME

In and after the sixteenth century, the European immigrants founded settlements throughout the North American continent. Indigenous peoples taught them how to build houses and grow crops like corn and peas so that the early settlers could get acclimated. These settlers took an interest in the appearances, clothing, and lifestyles of Indigenous peoples, whom they had never encountered before. They painted and photographed Indigenous peoples, often depicting them as romantic and peaceful. At the time, settlers created these paintings in an effort to encourage westward expansion. They viewed the nature of the western reaches of the continent as material for the development of the United States.