Robert Hudson Tannahill (1893-1969), Patron and Collector

The history of patronage and collecting in early twentieth-century America has received relatively little attention from art historians, and one of the most consistently overlooked figures in the history of art of this period is the philanthropist, the private individual devoted to the public support of the arts. The dissertation focuses upon one such figure, Robert Hudson Tannahill, upon the significance and impact of his collecting and support of modern art in Detroit, and upon the relationship of his activities to the broader patterns of collecting and patronage at the time. During the 1920s Tannahill began to collect, first became involved with the Detroit Institute of Arts, and came to know its Director, William R. Valentiner, whose commitment to modern art was to influence the course of his collecting and patronage. By the early 1930s he had begun to distinguish himself as a man of highly personal and advanced taste, seriously committed to the cause of modernism. Through his work with the Friends of Modern Art and the Detroit Artists Market, Tannahill contributed to the development of a modern collection at the Detroit Institute of Arts and to the encouragement of Detroit's artists. As a founding member of Detroit's Committee of the Museum of Modern Art and prime mover of the Modern Gallery of the Society of Arts and Crafts, he was responsible for organizing a number of importantly innovative exhibitions of modern American and European art, significantly enhancing its appreciation and acceptance in Detroit. Tannahill's private collection of over four hundred objects was left to the Detroit Institute of Arts in 1969. Through an analysis of the collection, Tannahill's taste is defined and his collecting patterns studied in the context of modern art patronage in the country at large. Although not part of the "first wave" of important American collectors of modern art, his collecting was generally in advance of fashion, and in the 1930s and '40s, he was, unquestionably, Detroit's most significant collector. The story of Robert Tannahill as patron and collector is, in many respects, typical of the American philanthropist. The study of his role in Detroit reveals how significant an impact one person can make and sheds light upon the broad subject of the patronage and collecting of modern art in this country.