Pipestone Quarry on the Coteau des Prairies, c. 1836 by George Catlin

Pipestone Quarry on the Coteau des Prairies, c. 1836, by George Catlin depicts the sacred red pipestone quarry in present-day Minnesota, figures working the rose-colored quartzite along an exposed rock face that stretches across the open prairie. Catlin, an American painter born in 1796, journeyed to the quarry in 1836 to become the first artist to visually document the site where Plains tribes had long gathered to extract stone for ceremonial pipe bowls, a place he described as a sheer wall of compact quartz reaching nearly two miles across the grassland.

Artist: George Catlin (1796–1872). Date: c. 1836.

Pipestone Quarry on the Coteau des Prairies. Historic American West Painting Canvas Print.