Archibald J. Motley Jr. was one of a very few African American artists to study at an art academy when he enrolled at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago--one of the first art schools in the United States to admit African American art students without overt racial segregation--in 1914.Henry Ossawa Tanner had blazed the way in the latter nineteenth century by pursuing a career in painting, and he had been followed by a few other pioneering black artists. Still, not many black artists could be deemed successful by the rigid standards they faced. Motley's experience was no exception to the usual rule of exclusionary practices, racial bias, and class distinction in the arts, but his will to succeed was both compelling and challenging. A handful of sympathetic white teachers would come to his aid early in his schooling and help move his career along.