Against the Odds: The Artists of the Harlem Renaissance tells the little-known story of African-American artists working during the 1920s and 1930s. More than just an art history lesson, the video tells the struggle of the American black population trying to redefine itself. After the 1919 race riots, the then-newly formed National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) wanted to show American blacks as a creative, intelligent group willing and able to make a positive contribution to society. To counter the racial stereotype of black Americans in the 1920s, the NAACP and the Urban League set about the task of training blacks in the visual and performing arts. One person offering assistance in this endeavor was William E. Harmon, who in 1922 established a foundation that exhibited artists and provided opportunities for performers to hold plays and concerts.

The Harlem Renaissance was both a complex political awakening to change and an art movement. African-American historians tell of the struggles black political leaders had trying to convert America's opinion of the black population from negative to positive. For example, David Levering Lewis, the author of When Harlem Was in Vogue, explains the Harlem Renaissance was "not about aesthetics but about improving the Negroes' lot in life." Art historians, on the other hand, present the influence of European art movements on these urban black artists. Clement A. Price, a Rutgers University historian, tells of the dissension erupting between independent-thinking artists and NAACP leaders who thought artists should look only to Africa for influence in their work.