Henry Ossawa Tanner - Legacy

Legacy

Tanner's work was influential during his career; he has been called "the greatest African American painter to date." The early paintings of William Edouard Scott, with whom Tanner studied in France, showcase the influence of Tanner’s technique. In addition, some of Norman Rockwell’s illustrations deal with the same themes and compositions that Tanner pursued. Rockwell's proposed cover of the Literary Digest in 1922 for example shows an older black man playing the banjo for his grandson. The light sources mirror Tanner's Banjo Lesson almost identically. A fireplace illuminates the right side of the picture while natural light enters from the left. Both use similar objects as well such as the clothing, chair, crumpled hat on the floor.

Sand Dunes at Sunset, Atlantic City (c. 1885 oil on canvas) hangs in the Green Room at the White House; it is the first painting by an African-American artist to enter the permanent collection of the White House. The painting is a landscape with a "view across the cool gray of a shadowed beach to dunes made pink by the late afternoon sunlight. A low haze over the water partially hides the sun." It was acquired during the Clinton administration from Dr. Rae Alexander-Minter, grandniece of the artist, by the White House Endowment Fund for $100,000.