My effort has been not only to put the Biblical incident in the original setting… but at the same time give the human touch to convey to my public th…

- Henry Ossawa Tanner

Get it - get it better or get it worse. No middle ground of compromise.

- Henry Ossawa Tanner

The physical characteristics of the child Jesus will always remain a point of discussion. No artist has ever produced a type, nor ever will, that has…

- Henry Ossawa Tanner

I will preach with my brush.

- Henry Ossawa Tanner

I believe the Negro blood counts, and counts to my advantage – though it has caused me at times a life of great humiliation and sorrow.

- Henry Ossawa Tanner

Many of the artists who have represented Negro life have seen only the comic, the ludicrous side of it, and have lacked sympathy with and appreciatio…

- Henry Ossawa Tanner

I was extremely timid and to be made to feel that I was not wanted, although in a place where I had every right to be, even months afterwards caused …

- Henry Ossawa Tanner