VISUAL
CREATIVITY
continued from page 3
reputations as first-rate artists of their time. The
style and content of Duncanson's works were
very much akin to the style of painting which
emanated from the Hudson River "school." Sim
ilarly, Duncanson and Jasper Francis Cropsey
a white artist who espoused the same style
were at ease when painting some local scenes of
America's vast panoramic landscape. The Hudson
River painters, as they were known,, actually
fashioned their style after the romantic natural
ism that was so popular in Europe at the time.
Duncanson's "Blue Hole, Flood Waters, Little
Miami River" which makes his meticulous con
cern for realistic detail very obvious, is equally
reminiscent of Cropsey's "Autumn on the Hud
son River," a shining example of that particular
mode of painting. On the other hand, Duncan
son's "Blue Hole . . ." is considered one of the
finest nineteenth-century landscapes ever painted
by an American artist. Tennyson remarked that
Duncanson's interpretation of his poem, "The
Lotus Eaters", had successfully captured the es
sence of his poetry. Yet American art historians
have chosen to overlook these facts. "The Lotus
Eaters" was first exhibited in England, thereby
establishing a substantial reputation for the black
artist in the British Isles. Unfortunately, the pres
ent whereabouts of the painting is unknown.
Bannister gave firm evidence of his artistic
prowess earlier in his career as a portrait painter
in Boston. The Rhode Island-born artist emerged
strikingly victorious when he captured the first
prize a gold medal at the 1876 Philadelphia
Centennial Exhibition for his painting, "Under
the Oaks." Strenuous efforts to find this work
have, unfortunately, proved fruitless. It is reliably
documented, however, that a Bostonian pur
chased the work for what is reputed to be the
highest price ever paid for a 19th century land
scape at the time. On the other hand, Bannister's
"Driving Home the Cows" makes known to us
that his painting inclinations also paralleled those
laudatory attributes of the Hudson River land
scapists. Like most portrait painters of the early nine
teenth century, black and white, Joshua Johnston
of Baltimore, and William Simpson, a free black
portraitist from Boston, found it difficult to sup
port themselves by portrait painting alone, even
though such commissions were granted by some
of the wealthiest and most socially prominent
families of their respective regions. They would,
as a result, often have to resort to house or sign
painting to make a living. Despite this intrusion
on the progress of their technical skills, both ar
tists succeeded in carving out highly respectable
reputations for themselves.
The first known black American to achieve
eminence as a neo-classical sculptor is Edmonia
Lewis (1843-ca. 1890) whose early art training was
received in Boston and later in Rome, Italy. Born
of a Chippewa Indian mother and an Afro-American
father, Edmonia apparently was possessed of
an ingratiating personality that equalled her for
midable talent. In Rome, she easily became a
favorite of the expatriate American colony there.
Her period of training in Italy found her occu
pied like most sculptors of that era with the
problems of mastering advanced sculpture tech
niques that would enable her to create in the
grand Graeco-Roman tradition. The sculptor's
celebrated "Forever Free," a white marble statue
that depicts an emancipated slave and his wife,
clearly demonstrates that her aim to achieve a
high degree of technical skill as a sculptor had
been attained. Like Bannister, the work of the
black sculptor was represented in the 1876 Phila
delphia Centennial, and she is known to have
exhibited in Europe. A major exhibition, The
White, Marmorean Flock, at Vassar College in
1972 featuring nineteenth century American neo
classical sculptors, gave due prominence to the
works of Edmonia Lewis.
The most celebrated of black American realist
romantic painters is Henry Ossawa Tanner (1859
1937) who, although a native of Pittsburgh, spent
the greatest part of his adult life in France where
he died. Tanner commenced his studies at the
Philadelphia Academy of Art where his principal
teachers were the now-famous Thomas Eakins
4
very good friend of Eakins who did a portrait
of his student which is now in the Hyde collec
tion in Glens Falls, New York.
Tanner Was an excellent draftsman, in the
manner of the 19th century Romantics. He was
often compared to Eakins; however, a more accu
rate comparison would be to both Albert Ryder
and Albert Blakelock. While his works parallel
that of these American masters, it also relates to
Rembrandt in terms of technique and composi
tion. Tanner's "Daniel in the Lion's Den" admir
ably illustrates this relationship. Well aware of
his Negritude, Henry Tanner did not allow this
concern to dominate his preference of subject
matter. Although his painting, "The Banjo
Lesson" (1893), is considered a classic work of
an ethnic subject, for the most part Tanner
found his inspiration in landscapes and in the
portrayal of Biblical themes.
and Thomas Hovenden. As a result he became a
While teaching as a very young man at Clark
University in Atlanta, he met Bishop Hartzell of
Cincinnati who was to play an important role
in his artistic career. The Bishop was so im
pressed with Tanner's artistic ability that he
arranged a one-man exhibition for him in Cin
cinnati. When the show ended, not one work
was sold, but the Bishop himself bought the
entire collection in an effort to help the young
artist morally and financially. With this
money. Tanner left America for Europe to realize
an ambition to work in an atmosphere free of
the virulent racism that permeated all American
life. During 1890 he enrolled in I'Academie
Julien in Paris where he studied with Benjamin
Constant and Jean-Paul Laurens. After five years
of disciplined study, his painting, "The Young
Sabot Maker", was shown at the prestigious
Salon des Artistes Francois. From that auspicious
debut, Tanner participated continuously in Salon
shows until 1924. It was in 1897 that he gained
international recognition occasioned by the
purchase of his work, "The Raising of Lazarus,"
by the French Government for the Luxembourg
"The Annunciation" which is now in the collec
tion of the Philadelphia Museum.
Tanner was virtually obsessed with the desire
to reinforce his paintings with authenticity; thus
he traveled widely including trips to Palestine
before the turn of the century and, much later,
to North Africa. The ensuing years brought in
creased productivity, as well as numerous awards
and honors to Tanner the most significant was
his nomination in 1923 by the French Government
as Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur. Later,
America was to accord him a similar tribute by
making him a full member of its National Acad
emy of Art and Design the first black Ameri
can to achieve this distinction. Except for an
occasional visit to the United States, Tanner re
mained in France with his wife a native of
San Francisco and his son, Jesse, who lives
there to this day.
After his death in Paris on May 25, 1937, in
terest in Tanner's works diminished consider
ably. Largely as a result of a major exhibition of
his paintings at Manhattan's Grand Central Gal
leries in December 1967, the most renowned of
all black artists was "rediscovered." Two years
later, The Smithsonian Institution in Washington
presented a large retrospective exhibit of his
oeuvres to critical and public acclaim. The show
was then circulated extensively in this country.
Major works of this black American master can
be found in the principal museums in this coun
try and abroad, as well as in many university
and private collections.
The year 1915 marked the beginning of the
Great Northern Migration of blacks from the
rural South to the urban North in quest of a
better life. Migrant blacks poured into the cities
at such a rate that these centers were not able
to accommodate them properly; they found life'
severe in the ghettos that awaited them. Some
intellectuals of that period, black and white, be
came disillusioned and sought redress through
expatriation and became known as the "Lost
Generation."
Among those remaining in the country were a
large contingent of primarily New York-based
black intellectuals (writers, painters and sculp
tors) who actively sought to analyze the national
situation as it specifically related to black peo
ple. Black artists, particularly those concerned
with helping all blacks gain a positive sense of
identity, made a point of reacquainting them with
their black heritage through their artistic crea
tions. Among the "pioneers" whose deep concern
for, and dedication to, the preservation of the
Afro-American's artistic heritage and growth are
painters Aaron Douglas, Palmer C. Hayden, W. H.
Johnson, Malvin Gray Johnson, Allan Rohan
Crite, Archibald Motley and Hale Woodruff, dean
of Afro-American artists; also sculptors William
Edmondson, Augusta Savage, Meta Warrick Ful
ler and Richmond Barthe to name only a few.
Black historian Lerone Bennett, Jr., remarks that
"this era has gone down in history as the Negro
Renaissance a period of exceptional creativity
by Negro artists and an equally exceptional re
ceptivity on the part of white people." During
the Renaissance, black artists received both en
couragement and financial support from various
white philanthropic organizations foremost
among them was the Harmon Foundation. A sur
vey of the Harmon Collection of Negro Art will
confirm that the black artist of the twenties was
extremely interested in: (1) Paying tribute to his
African homeland; (2) reminiscing about his prior
life in the South; and (3) offering commentary
on the pleasures and problems surrounding his
present urban existence. The overriding desire
of the black artist to project his Negritude can
be partially atributed to the penetrating effective
ness of Marcus Garvey's movement, the Uni
versal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA)
the group which successfully projected the
philosophy that "black is beautiful."
The vast majority of American artists of the
1930's survived only because the Federal Arts
Projects (WPA) made work for them. Many of
the artists who were engaged by the FAP, and
other federally supported community centers,
went on, to win considerable acclaim among
them Norman Lewis, Jacob Lawrence and Romare
Bearden. After World War II, returning black
veterans enrolled in art schools in unprecedented
numbers. The artists who matured as a result of
their involvement in the Federal Arts Program,
and those who emerged from the art schools of
the 1940's and 1950's, served as a nucleus to es
tablish the most immediate source of inspiration
for contemporary artists. In the meantime, the re
missness of galleries and museums in providing
exposure and encouragement, even to the quali
tative black artists, only fed fuel to an already
smoldering fire of increasing unrest in the na
tional black artistic community. The directors of
these public and private institutions continue to
operate as the "artistic taste-makers of America,"
meaning, of course, that black artists are judged
by double standards. A confrontation was in
evitable. The late 1960's gave birth to what may well be
termed a revolution by heretofore unnoticed black
artists against the white art establishment which
is primary responsible for their "invisible" status
in this country. Ironically, it was the Whitney
Museum of American Art that blatantly excluded
blacks from its 1968 survey of art created in the
nineteen-thirties a period when black artists
began to emerge in appreciable numbers. Simul
taneously with the opening of that exhibition,
black artists (and a goodly number of whites as
well) raised their voices and picket signs en masse
in protest against the Whitney for its obvious
racist attitude. A counter exhibition, featuring the
works of those artists who were not included in
the Whitney show, was organized at the Studio
Museum in Harlem causing a prominent critic
on The New York Times to reluctantly concede
that there were indeed some who should have
been chosen for the Whitney exhibition.
Since then, however, not only did the Whitney
stage a mammouth "black" show in 1970 (albeit
of highly dubious merit), virtually every major
university and museum in the country followed
suit (the lordly Metropolitan opted for the in
famous spectacle, HARLEM ON MY MIND). Ordi
narily, one would be extremely proud perhaps
even grateful if these gestures of professional
exposure had produced the desired results: that
quality black artists could enjoy participating in
a kind of cultural democracy in the plastic arts,
could be exhibited alongside their white counter
parts without the slightest consideration for
ethnicity. Almost without exception, the multi
tudinous "black" shows that have inundated us
in recent years (lacking as they were in discrimi
nating concern for individual excellence) can only
be described as mere token actions by the art
establishment a situation that has been aided
and abetted, unknowingly by members of the
current black "nationalist" art movement. The
principal objective of the "nationalists," they
maintain, is to elevate the status of "Negritude."
Fine! But what distresses this writer is the fact
that what they produce, for the most part, falls
so far short of what can indeed be considered art,
is an embarrassment. Moreover, their insistence
on literally forcing their highly emotional and
inconclusive ideology on their audience to
gether with an admitted disregard for universal
esthetic requirements they only render a gross
disservice to their cause. Aside from displaying
their vulnerability as human beings, they, as
artists, suffer doubly when they abandon essen
tial concern for esthetic criteria for the sake of
politicizing! In other words, too many black
artists who are "nationalisf'-inclined are much
too occupied with what they say rather than how
we1 it should be said. There are, to be sure,
notable exceptions including Benjamin Jones
continued on page 7
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Tanner's "The Banjo Lesson"