Art

Item Description

Artist and illustrator A.S. Packer was born September 27, 1901, in Chicago, Illinois and died on October 14, 1999 in Larchmont, New York.  He received training from the Art Institute of Chicago and the Academie Julian, Paris, France.  In 1935 he married Katherine Mode and started a family.

Packer's professional career consisted of working for the Chicago Tribune (1920's), the Daily News in New York City (1930's), various ad agencies in Ohio and California (early 1940's) and the Hearst Organization from 1943 until he retired in 1985.  He also taught drawing at Wainwright House and the Pelham Art Association

Packer spent time at the Air Force Academy commissioned to do paintings on site as part of a public relations campaign.  He painted commissioned portraits for private and corporate clients along with numerous caricature portraits of famous people.  These caricatures were published in various newspapers.  His line illustrations appeared in the American Weekly and on covers for Parade Magazine. 

Packer worked with a group of New York Illustrators who visited war veterans in hospitals to draw and paint their pictures.  These paintings were then sent home to their families.  He also did numerous drawings of his children, grandchildren and of his travels to Mexico, Portugal and Cape Cod. 

Most of the illustrations from the late 1920¿s though the early 1940¿s were done as paintings in oil or gouache.

Packer was a Life Member of the Society of Illustrators, New York City.  In 1933 his oil painting, Girl with Bowl of Fruit was accepted into exhibition at the Lyman Allyn Museum, Old Lyme, Connecticut.  Packer was President of the New Rochelle Art Association, 1966 ¿ 1968, and exhibited in The Great Illustrators of New Rochelle, 1988.   Circa 1995, an art gallery on Lexington Avenue in New York City held an exhibition of illustrators and artist from the Academie Julian which listed Packer in the catalogue. 

His oil portrait paintings, gouache illustrations and drawings were in exhibition at the Cape Cod Museum of Art, Dennis, Massachusetts with his daughter's paintings.  The exhibition was titled "Spanning the Years, A. S. Packer & Suzanne M. Packer" and ran from September 1 through November 18, 2007.