provide American readers with evidence of
African-American heroism, high morality, and
civic pride.
Tanner, Henry Ossawa (1859–1937)
One of America’s finest painters and an artist
whose evocative art and professional example in-
spired many American painters and leading artists
of the Harlem Renaissance. Tanner was the first of
seven children born to Rev. Benjamin Tanner and
his wife, Sarah Elizabeth Miller Tanner. Born in
Pittsburgh and raised in PHILADELPHIA, Henry
Tanner studied art at the Pennsylvania Academy of
the Fine Arts located in Philadelphia. He studied
with the renowned artist Thomas Eakins before
going on to pursue his studies in FRANCEat the
Académie Laurens. His successes in prestigious Eu-
ropean art competitions led to honors and enabled
Tanner to establish an art studio of his own. He
continued to work in France, at the Trépied, an
artists’ colony.
Tanner’s best-known paintings include a series
of moving portraits of African-American families.
His portrait entitled The Banjo Lesson(1893) was
one of several in which he represented children
learning from their elders, and the scenes were es-
pecially moving for the highly attentive and loving
interaction between the subjects. Tanner later de-
veloped a series of powerful biblical paintings that
included such works as The Annunciation(1898),
Christ Learning to Read(1910–1914), and Christ
and His Mother Studying the Scriptures(1910).
Tanner married Jessie Macauley Olssen, a mu-
sician of Swedish descent, in 1899. She was a
model for several of Tanner’s paintings including
The Annunciation.The couple’s only child, Jessie
Ossawa Tanner, was born in 1903. Their son went
on to study at Cambridge University and the Royal
School of Mines before suffering a nervous break-
down. Thanks to his father’s care, Jessie recovered
and went on to live a full and productive life. Jessie
Tanner died in 1925, a victim of pleurisy. Tanner
passed away in May 1937.
During the Harlem Renaissance, the emphasis
on African-American themes did generate criti-
cism of Tanner’s work that, by that point, did not
include an overwhelming amount of African-
American material. However, his steady career, in-
sightful visions, and lifelong dedication to art could
not diminish his status as one of the most highly
regarded American painters.Bibliography
Mathews, Marcia. Henry Ossawa Tanner, American Artist.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969.
Mosby, Dewey. Across Continents and Cultures: The Art
and Life of Henry Ossawa Tanner.Kansas City, Mo.:
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1995.Tarry, Ellen(1906–unknown)
An Alabama-born author, teacher, and journalist
who began her successful literary career just as the
Harlem Renaissance came to a close. The daughter
of John and Eula Meadows Tarry, she was born in
Birmingham, Alabama. Raised as a Protestant, she
converted to Catholicism in 1922. Tarry completed
her education in Alabama at the State Normal
School and began teaching in public schools in
Birmingham. She began her journalism career at
the Birmingham Truth,the official publication of
the Knights of Pythias. The majority of her publi-
cations related to African-American history and
culture, published under a regular column entitled
“Negroes of Note.”
Tarry relocated to New York City in 1929 and
became part of the city’s active African-American
literary and intellectual circles. She became a
member of the Negro Writer’s Guild, an organiza-
tion with which ARTHURSCHOMBURG,CLAUDE
MCKAY,STERLINGBROWN, and other prominent
writers were associated.
In 1940 Tarry published “Native Daughter,” a
feminist response to RICHARDWRIGHT’s recently
published NATIVESON.Later that year, she pub-
lished Janie Bell,the first of several children’s books
that she would write during her career.
Tarry enjoyed a successful and diverse career
in the years following the Harlem Renaissance. In
addition to writing children’s stories, she published
a variety of essays on race and religion. Her work
appeared in publications such as Catholic World
andInter-Racial Review.She contributed articles to
the AMSTERDAMNEWSand continued to publish
African-American historical works. These in-
cluded Katherine Drexel: Friend of the Neglected
(1958), Young Jim: The Early Years of James Weldon508 Tanner, Henry Ossawa