This would appear to be one of Sharp’s earliest paintings of his treasured buffalo hide teepee that he purchased from chief Many White Horses on the Blackfeet reservation in 1905.
This painting is closely related compositionally to one smaller painting, In Winter’s Embrace of about 1905, that was exhibited the galleries of Fishel, Adler & Schwartz in New York in 1907. (see related image, #703) In the exhibition catalogue for that show there was at least one painting that might fit the description of October Snow, Crow Reservation. It was titled October in Montana.
October Snow, Crow Reservation, Montana
Record ID: 674
Date: ca. 1905
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 20 x 30 in.
Signature / Inscription: LR: J.H.SHARP. On backing board in Sharp’s hand: Oct. Snow-Crow Reservation, Mont. / (Last skin teepee any American Indians owned) / Now in S.W. Museum in Los Angeles
Owner: Stark Museum of Art, Orange, TX
Accession Number: 31.25.57
Provenance: The artist; [?]; [Jane Hiatt, La Fonda Art Gallery, Taos, New Mexico]; H.J. Lutcher Stark, 1955; H.J. Lutcher Stark Estate; present owner: Nelda C. and H.J. Lutcher Stark Foundation, Orange, Texas, by bequest, 1965; accession to Stark Museum of Art, 1965
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