“This is an Indian/ settlement there are some/ houses in front of them/ may be seen women/ making fire and cooking./ There is a cart full of/ boys playing-a large field of corn is/ fenced in there are high mountains/ behind the houses” (Artist’s inscription, verso)
“Much like the Sun Dance drawing (Nº11), this one shows a bird's-eye view of a number of cabins and their garden plots on Lower Brulé Agency. Just as it was traumatic for the Sioux to give up a nomadic existence and live in log cabins, so too was the switch from hunting and gathering to farming. To the Sioux male, farming was demeaning and degrading work, but it was forced on the tribe as a whole, in the hope of civilizing them. Generally, it was unsuccessful.
In this drawing, as in Nº10 and Nº11, Bushotter provides the viewer with a panoramic scene. He shares this feature with a few other Hampton artists, notably Henry Fisherman (Nºs. 14 and 15). It was probably the result of the influence of white teachers as well as the group of artists who came from Fort Marion.” (p.28)
William S. Wierzbowski and Helen M. Mangelsdorf in Images of a Vanished Life: Plains Indian Drawing from the Collection of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 1985.