Henry Ossawa Tanner was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1859 to a prominent middle class family. His father was a bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, and despite his initial misgivings, he supported his son’s education at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. Tanner found an early mentor in Thomas Eakins, whose influence is seen in Tanner’s work throughout his career.  Upon graduation, Tanner eked out a living by opening a photography studio and teaching at Clark College.

In 1891, Tanner left to study and teach in Paris.  He attended Academie Julian and studied under Benjamin Constant and Jean-Paul Laurens.  It was here that he was able to develop his personal style, free from the prejudice found in the United States.   Early in his career, he painted genre scenes of African American life.  One of his most famous paintings from this period, The Banjo Lesson, demonstrated this intention of breaking the stereotypical caricature mold with its depiction of an older African American male teaching a young boy how to play the banjo, an instrument that had become an object of derision.

Despite the rise of modernism, he remained painting in a firmly academic manner and focused entirely on religious subjects for the rest of his career.  A trip to North Africa and the Holy Land brought about a mystical quality in his work that furthered his personal style while remaining true to his unwavering academicism.  His paintings were shown regularly in the salons in Paris - his painting Resurrection of Lazarus won the Third Class Medal at the Salons des Artistes, Francais, 1897- as well as stateside.  Tanner became the mentor for early 20th century African American artists who made pilgrimages to France to study and paint.  In 1927, he was inducted into the National Academy of Design.

His work has been shown in exhibitions at the Philadelphia Art Club; New York Public Library; Vose Galleries, Boston, MA; National Arts Clubs Galleries, NY; Corcoran Gallery Biennial; Century of Progress, Chicago; Philadelphia Art Alliance; Philadelphia Museum of Art; and the University of California, Los Angeles.  In 1969, a traveling retrospective of over 80 of Tanner’s paintings, drawings, and studies was held by the Frederick Douglass Institute and the National Collection of Fine Arts, Washington D.C.

His work is found in the collections of Atlanta High Museum of Art, GA; Art Institute of Chicago; Carnegie Collection; Pennsylvania Academy of the Arts; Philadelphia Museum of Art; Smithsonian American Art Museum; and the National Portrait Gallery, Washington D.C.