Nikkanochee, Prince of Econchatti, A Young Seminole Indian, Son of Econchattimico, King of Red Hills

Artist Frank W. Wilkin (English, active 1800 - 1842)

Formerly attributed to George Catlin (American, 1796 - 1872)

Date1841

MediumOil on canvas

DimensionsUnframed: 50 1/2 × 40 1/4 inches (128.27 × 102.24 cm)
Framed: 55 × 45 1/4 inches (139.7 × 114.94 cm)

Credit LinePurchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust

Object number33-12/2 A

On View

Not on view

Collections

European Art

Terms

DescriptionPlains Indian in buckskin with feather headdress, leather shield, and bow and arrows.Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Exhibition of the Royal Academy, MDCCCXLI: The seventy-third , London, 1841, no. 703, as Occola Nickkanochee, Prince of Econchotti, a young Seminole Indian .

Life on the Prairie: The Artist’s Record , Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, Ne., May 12–July 4, 1954, as George Catlin, Indian Chief.

Fine Arts Festival , Kansas State College, Manhattan, April 28–May 8, 1955.

Exhibition for Midwest Heritage Conference, Coe College, Cedar Rapids, IA, April 5–7, 1956.

Catlin, Bodmer, Miller: Artist Explorers of the 1830s , Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, Ne., May 1–26, 1963, as by George Catlin, Indian Chief.

Four Centuries of American Art , Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, Mn., November 27, 1963–January 19, 1964, as by George Catlin, Indian Boy.

Four Centuries of American Masterpieces , The Gallery at the Better Living Center, New York World’s Fair, May 22–October 18, 1964, no. 11, as by George Catlin, Indian Boy.

The American Vision: Paintings 1825–1875 , Knoedler and Co., New York, October 8–November 2, 1968.

Nineteenth Century American Painting , William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, February 17–March 31, 1974, as by George Catlin, Indian Boy.

Heads of State and Some Friends, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, January 4–February 6, 1983, no. 55.

Gallery Label

Nikkanochee was a Florida Seminole Indian taken to England by his guardian Andrew Welch. Welch published a book about Nikkanochee's experiences in which a lithograph of the Museum's painting, in its original full-length size, appears as the frontispiece. Indeed, infrared reflectography reveals that the canvas suffered damage and was cropped at its present bottom edge. In both its original and present form, the image of Nikkanochee reflects the typical 19th-century Anglo-European view of the Indian as noble yet primitive. Dressed in traditional Seminole clothing and adorned with the weapons of Indian warfare, Nikkanochee stands firmly as a child-warrior.

Once attributed to George Catlin, Nikkanochee was actually executed by British portraitist Frank Wilkin and exhibited at the Royal Academy in London in 1841.

Provenance

with Ehrich Galleries, New York;

Purchased by the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1933.

Published References

The Exhibition of the Royal Academy , exh. cat. (London: Royal Academy, 1841), 33.

Andrew Welch, A Narrative of the Early Days and Remembrances of Oceola Nikkanochee, Prince of Econchatti (London: Hatchard and Son, Piccadilly, 1841), 217.

Algernon Graves, The Royal Academy of Arts: A Complete Dictionary of Contributors and their work from its foundation in 1769 to 1904 (London: George Bell and Sons and Henry Graves, 1905), 8:275.

“The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art: Complete Catalogue of Paintings and Drawings,” Art News 32 (December 9, 1933), 28, as by George Catlin, Indian Boy.

Handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art (Kansas City, Mo.: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1933), 136, as by George Catlin, Indian Boy.

Life on the Prairie: The Artist’s Record , exh. cat. (Omaha, Ne.: Joslyn Art Museum, 1954), 5, as by George Catlin, Indian Chief.

Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts , 4^th ed. (Kansas City, Mo.: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 143, as by George Catlin, Indian Boy.

Four Centuries of American Art , exh. cat. (Minneapolis, Mn.: The Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 1963), unpaginated, as by George Catlin, Indian Boy.

Four Centuries of American Masterpieces , exh. cat. (New York: New York World’s Fair, 1964), unpaginated.

“Painting,” Time, June 26, 1964, 67.

“George Catlin painting…from the Nelson Gallery,” Kansas City Star , October 15, 1972.

Ross E. Taggart and George L. McKenna, eds. Arts of the Occident. Vol. 1. Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts . 5^th ed. (Kansas City, Mo.: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1973), 1: 173, 251, as by George Catlin, Nikkanochee, Prince of Econchatti.

William H. Truettner, “George Catlin, Frank Wilkin, and the Prince of Econchatti,” Apollo 105 (February 1977), 124–26, 126.

Heads of State and Some Friends , exh. cat. (Kansas City, Mo.: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1983), 26.

Henry Adams, Handbook of American Paintings in the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1991), 110–11.

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