Painter Eanger Irving Couse, known professionally as E.I. Couse, was born in Saginaw, Michigan, on September 3, 1866. He began drawing on his own from an early age and frequently depicted his family members and neighbors, including members of the Chippewa tribe who lived nearby. This would spark a lifelong desire to capture the lives of Native Americans and his ensuing romanticization of the West.

Couse’s formal art training began at age sixteen when he left high school to enroll in drawing and painting courses at the Art Institute of Chicago, where he soon garnered awards for his work. This was followed by two years at the National Academy of Design, New York, and in the fall of 1886 he traveled to Paris to attend the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and Academie Julian. Finding success with his work in France, including prizes earned at the Paris Salon, he would remain there for ten years with his wife, Virginia Walker, whose family operated a ranch in Washington state.

Though focusing primarily on landscapes and people of the Normandy coast, his desire to paint a Native American for the Paris Salon brought him back to the U.S. for a year, where he lived on his wife’s ranch and hired Klikitat tribal models. Thus he created his most famous - and now most controversial - work, titled “The Captive,” which today is considered an example of the racial and sexual stereotyping of indigenous Americans by settlers. In 1892 he successfully exhibited “The Captive” at the Paris Salon.

Beginning in 1893 Couse divided his time between Normandy and New York City. In 1902 the Couses traveled for the first time to New Mexico. They soon established a summer residency in Taos and Couse co-founded the Taos Society of Artists, becoming its first elected president in 1915. He would continue to work in Taos and live in New York until his death on April 26, 1936 in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Awards and honors:
1900, 1902: Hallgarten Prize (2nd, 1st), National Academy of Design, NY
1906: Altman Prize, National Academy of Design
1907: Isidor Prize, Salmagundi Club, NY
1915: Silver medal, Panama Pacific International Exposition, SF
1921: Lippincott Prize, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Boston, MS
No dates: American Exposition, Buffalo, NY; Boston Art Club; Corcoran Gallery, Washington, D.C.