3 / History and Memory

• • Lienzo of IhuitlanMexican School, Oaxaca	Lictors Returning to Brutus the Bodies of his SonsJacques-Louis David (French, 1748–1825)	Memory Board (lukasa)Luba artist, Democratic Republic of the Congo	The Railroad Stations Were at Times So Over-Packed with People Leaving that Special Guards Had to Be Called in to Keep Order from the Migration SeriesJacob Lawrence (American, 1917–2000)	Surrender of BredaDiego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez (Spanish, 1599–1660)	“Many fall in battle and King Harold is killed” (detail) from the Bayeux TapestryUnknown artist(s), France or England
    “Alexander Fights the Monster of Habash” from the ShahnamaUnknown artist, Tabriz, Iran	“Battle of Lanka, between Rama and Ravana, King of the Rakshasas” from the RamayanaRajasthani School, India	Column of Trajan Roman artist(s)	Stu-mick-o-súcks, Buffalo Bull’s Back Fat, head chief, Blood TribeGeorge Catlin (American, 1796–1872)	Memorial to the Murdered Jews of EuropePeter Eisenman (American, b. 1932)	American Marines Raising American Flag on Mount Suribachi, Iwo JimaRosenthal, Joe (American, 1911–2006)
    Mulackstrasse 37, Berlin from The Writing on the Wall, Projections in Berlin’s Jewish QuarterShimon Attie (American, b. 1957)	Untitled, page number 21, from the Arrow’s Elk Society LedgerArrow (Elk Society), Cheyenne (active 19th century), Central Plains	Racing Clocks Run Slow: Archaeology of a RacetrackShimon Attie (American, b. 1957)	The Triumphal Arch of Maximilian IAlbrecht Dürer (German, 1471–1528) and others	The Triumph of Juliers from the Marie de’ Medici CyclePeter Paul Rubens (1577–1640)

expert perspective

Barbara Thompson Curator for the Arts of Africa and the Americas, Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University

“

As always in our own histories, we send our own people out to document the history of others and certainly Catlin or Edward Curtis—at different points in time, but certainly both of them—were capturing images and using images of native peoples to educate American society about these so called ‘dying races’ and some cases ‘the noble savage.’ Both of them were presenting a very romantic view of that moment in history and a very romantic view of the quintessential native—not looking at and not presenting the nuances of native life and native identities that existed. But, of course, nobody, or a very few people, in Western society questioned the truths behind those images or the validity, never really thought about it or considered how staged some of these were, and just even the inaccuracies of staging or inaccuracies of identity in some of Catlin’s paintings that he might identify somebody with a name or a given cultural affiliation which was wrong.”