Archives Directory for the History of Collecting in America

Henderson, Harry print view role Scholar/Critic/Expert Collector dates 1914-2003 city New York state NY other cities Kittaning, PA; Croton-on-Hudson, NY; sex M historical notes Harry B. Henderson was a freelance writer, journalist, and editor. He was born in 1915 in Kittanning, Pennsylvania, and began his career writing for magazines such as Colliers, Harper’s, Reader’s Digest, Argosy, and Look, covering various topics from music to politics. Henderson met the artist Romare Bearden in 1946 through photographer Sam Shaw, who often took photographs for Henderson’s freelance articles and shared a studio with Bearden. In 1965, Bearden conceived the idea for a history of Black American artists while preparing a talk for the Museum of Modern Art in New York and asked Henderson to be his partner. The ultimate result was A History of African American Artists, a collection of more than 50 biographies of Black artists published five years after Bearden’s death in 1988. The work offers compelling portraits of artists, such as 19th century painter Henry Ossawa Tanner and his mock crucifixion by jealous white colleagues. Other artists in the illustrated volume include Jacob Lawrence, Edward Bannister, Archibald Motley, Elizabeth Catlett, Augusta Savage and Robert Duncanson. Henderson and Bearden uncovered material not only in the United States but also in Europe, where many black American artists went to escape prejudice and find greater creative freedom. Eleven works by Bearden from Henderson’s collection were later included in an auction of 19th and 20th century prints and drawings conducted by Swann on September 15, 2005. decades of activity 1960-1970 1970-1980 1980-1990 1990-2000 2000-2010 updated 02/14/2025 10:12:30 bibliographic search Search Frick Art Reference Library Catalog Search Photoarchive Search Worldcat Search Library of Congress Name Authority File (LCNAF) Search Virtual International Authority File (VIAF) Archives/Repository Collection Title Collection Details Syracuse University Libraries Special Collections Research Center Jacob Lawrence Papers see details... see also: Bearden, Romare «  back