Henry Ossawa Tanner

Henry Ossawa Tanner (1859–1937) was an American painter and the first African-American artist to gain global fame. In 1891, Tanner moved to France to study at the Académie Julian. His painting ‘Daniel in the Lions Den’ (1895) was accepted into the 1896 Salon, the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

Tanner’s Resurrection of Lazarus (1896, Musée d’Orsay, Paris) was purchased by the French government after winning the third-place medal at the 1897 Salon. In 1923, the French government elected Tanner chevalier of the Legion of Honor.