Elbridge Burbank was born in Harvard, Illinois in 1858. He attended the Chicago Art Academy and took a job painting scenery for “Northwest Magazine” along the route of the Northern Pacific Railroad.   In 1887, he studied in Munich, where he became friends with Joseph Sharp, William Leigh, and Toby Rosenthal.  After returning to Chicago, he was commissioned to paint a series of American Indian portraits.  Between 1895 to 1907, he produced paintings of members of more than 125 types of North American Indians including notable chiefs.  He was the only artist to paint Geronimo from life.  He began exhibiting at the National Academy of Design in 1895 and continued to exhibit there until 1900.  From 1900, he traveled in the West and divided his time between California, Arizona, Oklahoma, and New Mexico.  Elbridge Burbank died in California in 1949 after being hit by a cable car.

Studied

Chicago Art Academy, 1874-78, with Emil Carlsen, Felix Regamey, and J.F. Gookins; in Munich with Paul Nauen, Friedrich Fehr, and Toby Rosenthal, 1889.

Member

Am. Artists Cl., Munich, 1889; Chicago SA, 1893; Cosmopolitan Cl., Chicago, 1895.

Exhibited

Chicago SA, 1893 (prize); NAD, 1895-1900; BAC; Soc. Western Artists; PAFA, 1894, 1896-99, 1903; AIC; Cotton States Expo, Atlanta, 1895 (med., prize); Trans-Miss. Expo., Omaha; Tenn. Centennial Int’l Expo., Nashville; Pan.-Am. Exp., Buffalo, 1901; Louisiana Purchase Expo., St. Louis, 1904; Kanst Gal., Los Angeles, 1907; Marshall Field’s, Chicago, 1910.

Work

Field Mus.; Newberry Library, Chicago; Smithsonian Inst.; Butler Inst. Am. Art.

Resources

WW27; Hughes, Artists in California, 80; P&H Samuels, 75; add’l info. courtesy Joel Dryer, History of Illinois Painters; Who’s Who, 502-503; askart.com.