1825 watercolour of bison hunt sells for $158,800 US

An 1825 watercolour by the first artist known to record life in Manitoba's Red River colony has sold for $158,500 US at Sotheby's auction house in New York.

That was just above the top estimate of $150,000 US that Sotheby's had expected for the painting by Peter Rindisbacher, a Swiss artist who was working with the Hudson's Bay Company in the area south of present-day Winnipeg.

The watercolour on rough parchment, titled Hunting the Bison, is a winter scene of dogs helping to hunt a bison, with hunters in the background.

It was purchased by a collector from the American Midwest, Sotheby's said.

Rindisbacher moved to the Red River valley when he was just 15 and was 19 when he painted Hunting the Bison.

He left for Wisconsin in 1826 with his family after their farm was flooded out. He later moved to St. Louis and set up an artist studio but died at age 28 of cholera.

Rindisbacher's images of Western Plains Indians and their lifestyle, painted during his years in the Red River Colony, were a sensation in Europe, according to Sotheby's.

Library and Archives Canada has a collection of 40 Rindisbacher works because of his significance as an early chronicler of First Nations life.