W. Langdon Kihn

Motivated by a desire to document the disappearing aboriginal culture, he spent many years visiting and living with Indian tribes in the Western United States.

These closely studied physiognomies show no trace of the sentimental idealization from which most painters of Indian subjects find it almost impossible to escape.

Each is firm, clear, and direct, recording the subtle differences of aspect difficult enough to discern in races other than our own, and seizing the essential message of the face with youthful certainty and conviction.

[6]Throughout his career, he also illustrated a number of books, including Indian Days in the Canadian Rockies by Marius Barbeau (1923) and Pocahontas and Her World by Frances Carpenter (1961).

[9] His work is in the permanent collections of, among others, the McCord Museum in Montreal, Quebec,[10] and the Davison Art Center Gallery at Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut.