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Ephemeral Beauty: Al Parker
and the American Women's Magazine, 1940-1960
June 9 - October 28, 2007
For a time, that age-old
question, "What do women want?" was answered by illustrator Al
Parker and his contemporaries who worked for America's leading women's magazines
during the mid-twentieth century. Parker's masterful illustrations often
focused on attractive love interests and happy stay-at-home-moms who (in
the optimism of a post-World War II nation) appear delighted by the modern
novelties of suburban family life. From mothers and daughters pursuing recreational
activities, such as skiing and swimming together, to more domestic pursuits,
like baking in matching outfits, to his images of glamorous seductresses
and betrayed heroines, Parker created idealized portrayals of women in pictures
that have profoundly influenced our cultural conception of what it means
to be beautiful. Ephemeral Beauty: Al Parker and the American Women's
Magazine, 1940-1960, on view June 9 through October 28, 2007 at the
Norman Rockwell Museum, pays tribute to Al Parker's prolific oeuvre and
to the period in which he lived.
Known as "The Dean of Illustrators," Parker,
who died in 1985, was a celebrity in his time and counted Norman Rockwell
among his many admirers. His name is virtually unknown today, yet his influence
on American post-war culture and society had a far-reaching effect, as his
illustrations defined and shaped the dreams and desires of a nation on the
rebound.
"Al Parker emerged in the 1930s to establish a vibrant
visual vocabulary for a new suburban life so desired in the aftermath of
the Depression and World War II," said Exhibition Curator Stephanie
Haboush Plunkett. "More graphic and less detailed than the paintings
of the luminary Norman Rockwell, who was a contemporary and an inspiration
to him, Parker's stylish compositions were sought after by editors and art
directors for their contemporary look and feel."
Parker's illustrations were ever evolving, keeping him
one step ahead of his many imitators. One of his greatest skills was to
constantly change his style, thematic approach, and media. Making magazine
history, he created illustrations for five fiction articles in the September
1954 issue of Cosmopolitan, each under a pen name in a different artistic
style. "Change is a style in itself," Parker said. "Developing
an approach and then dropping it in favor of something fresh is a completely
calculated move on my part."
"Norman Rockwell Museum is excited to present the
first retrospective on Al Parker, an influential artist in shaping post-war
American culture through published visual imagery. His stylized vision of
American women both reflected and helped to create the feminine 'ideal'
in the decades that preceded the women's movement. His art is beautiful
and arresting," commented Norman Rockwell Museum director Laurie Norton
Moffatt. "Both Norman Rockwell and Al Parker painted idealized scenes
of post-war domesticity that have seeped into our subconscious and shaped
our image of the American ideal."
This groundbreaking exhibition is the first in-depth examination
of the influential illustrator's work. Parker's stylish virtuosity and the
edginess of his compositions were influenced by photography, jazz, and modern
painting. His innovative, modernist artworks created for mass-appeal women's
magazines and their advertisers captivated his (primarily female) audience,
and reflected and profoundly influenced the values and aspirations of American
women and their families during the post-war era. He was best-known for
his modernist deployment of line, patterning, and bold, flat colors, as
well as his famous "Mother-Daughter" covers for Ladies' Home Journal
which began in 1939 and ran for 17 years.
Ephemeral Beauty: Al Parker and the American Women's
Magazine, 1940-1960, explores the themes of family,
romance, gender roles, artistic and cultural influences, and the commercial
climate that influenced the creative process. A segment of the exhibition
offers insights into the artist's process, from first idea to finished painting
and published work. A founder of modern glamour illustration, Parker's innovative
images were sought by authors and editors and he produced an extensive body
of work for magazines such as Cosmopolitan, McCall's, Ladies' Home Journal,
and Good Housekeeping.
The exhibition has been organized into thematic sections.
In addition to an introduction, the sections include An Age of Romance (romantic
fiction and the glamour aesthetic); Domestic Bliss (the roles of women as
wife, mother, homemaker, and rarely, as wage earner); Perfect Family (the
artist's legendary Ladies' Home Journal "Mother-Daughter" cover
series); Selling Dreams (advertising and mass-market women's magazines);
Re-Imagining the American Woman (which features works by contemporaries
of Parker's, such as John LaGatta, Coby Whitmore, Jon Whitcomb, John Gannam,
Rolf Armstrong, Haddon Sundbloom, Tom Lovell, and Edwin Georgi); and a biographical
section called Al Parker, Innovator, which includes mementos of his life
and large-scale photos of the artist at work and at play.
In addition to his talents as an illustrator, Al Parker
was a respected jazz musician who became the drummer in a jazz band populated
by instrument-playing members of New York's Society of Illustrators. During
World War II, their performances in hospitals and on bases were punctuated
by drawing sessions that produced cast inscriptions and personal portraits
as mementos. The Society of Illustrators has loaned Al Parker's remarkable
drum to the Norman Rockwell Museum for inclusion in the exhibition. It features
an impressive array of autographs by notable artists and musicians. Its
skins continue to be signed by inductees to the Illustrators Hall of Fame,
an honored list to which Parker was named in 1965. Famous people who have
signed the drum include musicians Benny Goodman, Buddy Rich, and Tony Bennett;
actress Gene Tierney; and illustrators Norman Rockwell, Jon Whitcomb, C.
Peter Helk, Ben Stahl, John Atherton, Tom Lovell, Harold Von Schmidt, Steven
Dohanos, and Coby Whitmore.
The exhibition takes an in-depth look at Parker's artistic
process. Included are his sketches and photographic references, background
on his artistic influences, which were as diverse as the artist himself,
and range from J.C. Leyendecker and Norman Rockwell to Mary Cassatt and
Japanese prints. Examples of correspondence with his readers are also included
in the exhibition.
Loans of artwork for this exhibition have come from the
extensive Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections, at Washington
University Libraries in St. Louis; The Eisenstat Collection of American
Illustration, Robert T. Horvath, the Museum of American Illustration at
the Society of Illustrators, The Sordoni Collection, Carol and Murray Tinkelman,
and from the seminal collection of Kit and Donna Parker, the artist's son
and daughter-in-law.
The Norman Rockwell Museum has published a 48-page catalog
to accompany the exhibition. It contains a forward by Norman Rockwell Museum
Director Laurie Norton Moffatt, and essays by Norman Rockwell Museum's Chief
Curator and Associate Director for Exhibitions Stephanie Haboush Plunkett;
Alice A. Carter, artist, writer and professor in the School of Art and Design
at San Jose State University; Wayne Fields, Director of American Cultural
Studies, of Washington University in St. Louis; and D. B. Dowd, Professor
of Visual Communications, Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts, Washington
University. The authors explore Parker's profound influence in creating
culture and style in post-war America, not only for women and the middle-class
aspirations of the burgeoning post-war generations, but for dozens of illustrators
who admired and aspired to emulate Parker's modern influence on classic
narrative image-making.
Wall panel texts for the exhibition:
-
- Introductory text
-
- "I think one of the things I like best about illustration is the
fact that things are always changing. It's always tomorrow."
- -- Al Parker, 1964
-
- A founder of the modern glamour aesthetic, Alfred Charles Parker (1906-1985),
defined the progressive look and feel of published imagery at a time of
sweeping change, when Americans sought symbols of hope and redemption on
the pages of our nation's periodicals. His innovative modernist artworks
created for mass-appeal women's magazines like Ladies' Home Journal, Good
Housekeeping, McCall's, and Cosmopolitan, captivated upwardly mobile mid-twentieth
century readers, reflecting and profoundly influencing the values and aspirations
of American women and their families during the post-war era.
-
- Leaping beyond the constraints of traditional narrative picture making,
Al Parker emerged in the 1930s to establish a vibrant visual vocabulary
for the new suburban life so desired in the aftermath of the Depression
and World War II. More graphic and less detailed than the paintings of
luminary Norman Rockwell, who was a contemporary and an inspiration to
the artist, Parker's stylish compositions were sought after by editors
and art directors for their fresh look and feel. Embraced by an eagerly
romantic public who aspired to the ideals of beauty and lifestyle reflected
in his illustrations, Parker's art also revealed a penchant for reinvention,
and his ongoing experiments with visual form kept him ahead of the curve
for decades. His vibrant images, borne of diverse methodologies, inspired
and entertained millions who encountered them at the turn of a page.
-
-
- Women's Magazines: Picturing the American Dream
-
- "The magazines of the early 1940s concentrated on new formats
for entertaining their most important reader: the young housewife and mother.
The need was met in editorial art by depicting an idealized world peopled
with handsome men and gorgeous women."
- -- Al Parker
-
- In today's digital information age, it is difficult to imagine the
role that magazines played in a society quite different from our own, in
which radio and telephone offered the only technological connection between
home and the larger world. Ephemeral by design and available at low cost,
Ladies' Home Journal, Good Housekeeping, McCall's, Woman's Home Companion,
Pictorial Review and other leading monthlies provided a steady stream of
information, entertainment, and advice to vast, loyal audiences. While
top publications boasted subscriptions of two to eight million during the
1940s and 1950s, anxiously awaited journals were shared among family and
friends, bringing readership even higher. Fiction and serialized novels,
poetry, articles on fashion and beauty, and guidance on marriage, child
rearing, and household management were staples, second only to the array
of advertisements and product enticements that supported the bottom line
and occupied the most space in each issue.
-
- Richly visual, mid-twentieth-century magazines often relied upon the
abilities of gifted illustrators to engage the attention and emotions of
their constituents in order to sell subscriptions and products. Al Parker
and other artists working for publication became trusted contributors,
attracting dedicated fans and attaining true celebrity status. Their ingenious,
romantic images portrayed a compelling picture of the life that many aspired
to, delineating a clear path to fulfillment and success.
-
-
- Perfect Family: Al Parker's Mother and Daughter Covers
-
- "These cover girls really started something! Since their
introduction in 1939, American women have been adopting them, copying their
clothes, flooding us with letters-making them 'part of the family.'"
- -- Ladies' Home Journal, 1949
- When the first of Al Parker's famed mother and daughter covers for
Ladies' Home Journal was published in February 1939, his graceful
silhouettes gliding across the ice in perfect unison and in matching outfits
created a sensation. Over the course of the next thirteen years, Parker's
fair-haired cover girls celebrated holiday traditions and shared a love
of sport but also played their part during World War II. Resourceful and
good-natured, they modeled best behavior by rationing, sending letters
abroad, and taking on dad's chores at home and in the garden. America's
ideal family was reunited in July 1945 when Parker's mother and daughter
welcomed their returning soldier, a powerful image that inspired another
narrative at the outset of the baby-boomer generation. By that December,
two knitted booties-one pink and one blue-were already underway, and in
1946, a son was born.
-
- "Al Parker's famous Mother and Daughter covers grew out of the
fact that Mrs. Gould and I used to skate on Sunday afternoon in Princeton
at Baker's Rink," said Ladies' Home Journal editor Bruce Gould in
1951. "Since neither of us skate very well, we had plenty of time
to watch those who did. One thing particularly attracted our attention.
Mothers who were very good skaters themselves . . . were teaching their
little daughters and taking more pride in their daughters' progress than
in their own undisputed prowess. This spectacle of the proud mother and
aspiring daughter seemed to us to have cover possibilities."
-
- Gould and his wife, Beatrice Blackmar Gould, who was also a Ladies'
Home Journal editor, communicated their concept to Parker, who began
experiments on the theme. After several tries, he eliminated distracting
backgrounds in favor of a clean poster design that emphasized strong, simple
forms and recognizable narratives. The artist's last mother and daughter
cover was published in May 1952. His portrayal of an officer's joyful return
to his still-beautiful wife and growing family during the Korean War conflict
brought an era of the artist's career, and the magazine's history, to a
close. Ladies' Home Journal's covers were solely photographic after
that, completing the transition away from traditional narrative illustration
that had begun in the latter part of the previous decade. Photography captured
the moment for many publications that were striving to remain current,
relegating the art of illustration to a more decorative or conceptual function.
-
-
- Re-Imagining the American Woman
"Prettiness prevailed, and warts and all were a no-no."
- -- Al Parker
-
- Though expected to manage households and raise children while retaining
an aura of attractiveness and accomplishment, many middle class women did
not have the means to achieve these goals. Opportunities for education
were limited, housework was time consuming, and in mid-twentieth century
publications, professional employment was not a subject of serious consideration.
From their inception, Ladies' Home Journal, Good Housekeeping and others
encouraged the belief that, despite all obstacles, women could be charismatic
purveyors of taste and culture, and were instrumental in helping their
families attain the American dream. The suburban home, replete with late-model
cars, new appliances, and amusements, became synonymous with post-war success.
-
- "We all want but one thing from our magazines," declared
a March 1942 Woman's Home Companion reader, "something that helps
us to make our lives better and richer with the beauty of living."
While not all were inspired to this extent, magazine content addressed
many facets of women's lives. The very existence of mass circulation periodicals
designed to instruct women in their appearance, duties, and values reveals
fundamental differences in cultural attitudes toward female and male gender
roles. Owned and managed almost exclusively by men, journals for women
often registered a particularly male conception of reader preferences.
But important women editors like Beatrice Blackmar Gould of Ladies' Home
Journal also played a significant role. In the words of her husband and
fellow editor, Bruce Gould, "Beatrice was remembering her own dishwashing,
bread baking, poetry-loving mother." Gertrude Lane, who served as
editor of Woman's Home Companion from 1919 to 1941, profiled a typical
reader as "a woman who wants to do less housework so that she will
have time for other things. She is intelligent and clearheadedShe is forever
seeking new ideas; I must keep her in touch with the best."
-
-
- Leader of the Pack: Al Parker and His Contemporaries
-
- "While the rest of us are working knee-deep in a groove you are
forever changing and improving. You have brought more freshness, charm
and vitality to illustration than any other living illustrator."
- -- Norman Rockwell, from a letter to Al Parker, 1948
-
- Lauded for his visual eclecticism and fearless experiments with media
and compositional design, Al Parker garnered acclaim on the pages of mid-twentieth
century magazines, and his popularity with publishers, readers, and advertisers
soared. Cropped compositions and extreme close-ups inspired by film and
by photography, which was a prime competitor for magazine pages at the
time, made him the artist to emulate. In the wake of his success, many
professional illustrators followed his artistic lead. Informal poses, bold
layouts emphasizing color and form over narrative detail, high-key palettes,
and unique, eye-stopping props became the visual language of the day.
-
- For Parker, change was a style in itself. Developing a look and then
dropping it in favor of something fresh was both calculated and intuitive.
"There is a great demand now, more than ever before, for individuality
in art. You aren't expected to imitate. You are expected to do something
personal," he said. Despite his popularity, the path to a finished
illustration "was not strewn with roses" for "innumerable
taboos abounded." Uplifting images reflecting prevailing cultural
attitudes were required and the preferences of art directors became points
of departure. "If one editor favored green, green predominated the
palette. Red was reserved for the editor who abhorred green," Parker
observed.
-
- Many talented illustrators looked to Parker for inspiration, appropriating
and sometimes refining the tenets that he originated. But his inexhaustible
quest to find new visual solutions could not be taught. "Al and I
were more or less contemporaries and worked for . . . the same magazines,
but our professional relationship might be described more accurately as
master and disciple," said illustrator Jon Whitcomb. Continuing his
experiments, Parker made magazine history by creating illustrations for
five fiction articles in the September 1954 issue of Cosmopolitan magazine,
each under a pen name in a different artistic style.
-
-
- The End of an Era
-
- By the late 1950s, magazine publishing had undergone substantial change
inspired by a trend toward suburban living that reduced newsstand sales,
making women's periodicals less appealing to advertisers. Rising production
and circulation costs produced shrinking profit margins and television
became the media of choice for information and entertainment. To combat
this trend, a range of creative marketing techniques were employed. Geographically
specialized and split editions allowed manufacturers to test advertisements
by reaching segmented markets. Striking graphics, product samples, and
foldouts engaged audiences but could not stem the tide that would ultimately
create less opportunity for artists, and even Parker was not immune. By
the end of the 1960s, illustration-friendly publications like The Woman's
Home Companion, Collier's, and The Saturday Evening Post had ceased
publication, and many others had changed course.
-
- Parker and others found some relief on the pages of magazines like
Sports Illustrated and Fortune, which continued to reserve space for expressive
entries by artists. Sports Illustrated invited Parker to capture the excitement
of premier auto racing at the Monaco Grand Prix for its readers, a highlight
of his career. Painting and photographing on location with little editorial
oversight, he produced a masterful suite of paintings that spread across
eight pages of the May 11, 1964, issue. Experiential and documentary, this
vibrant visual essay is imbued with a sense of local color, providing an
intimate glimpse of the events that unfold under the artist's gaze.
-
-
- Al Parker, Innovator
-
- "Art involves a constant metamorphosis . . . due both to the nature
of the creative act and to the ineluctable march of time."
- -- Al Parker
-
- Born on October 16, 1906, in St. Louis, Missouri, Al Parker began his
creative journey early in life, encouraged by parents with an affinity
for the arts. His precocious illustrations brought song lyrics to life
on the rolls of his mother's player piano, and hours spent listening to
jazz in the record department of his parents' furniture store inspired
lifelong love of music. At the age of fifteen, Parker took up the saxophone,
and by the following summer, was proficient enough to lead his own Mississippi
riverboat band. Musical excursions offered him the chance to sketch fans
between sets and play with jazz greats like Louis Armstrong.
-
- Parker played the saxophone, clarinet, and drums to fund his education,
and from 1923 to 1928, became immersed in the study of art at the St. Louis
School of Fine Arts at Washington University. His first professional assignment,
a series of department store window displays, landed him a job in a commercial
art studio. Imposing deadlines underscored the speed and facility required
to complete illustrations for the agency's client base, providing invaluable
experience. But the studio's practice of signing its name to his efforts
brought a frustrating tag of anonymity, and inspired him to set out on
his own.
-
- In 1930, a cover contest sponsored by House Beautiful brought
Parker an honorable mention and entrée into the world of national
magazine publishing. The visibility of cover illustration and its viability
as a lucrative outlet during the depression era were incentives to make
eastern contacts. Parker's elegant, stylized drawings were sent to a New
York artists' representative and soon sold to Ladies' Home Journal.
Judged to be "too far out" for fiction, his art first appeared
on the magazine's fashion pages, initiating a long association with the
prominent women's monthly. The artist's first fiction manuscript came from
Woman's Home Companion in 1934, turning the tide toward the steady stream
of assignments from Good Housekeeping, McCall's, Collier's, Cosmopolitan,
American, and Pictorial Review that followed. In 1936, Parker and
his family moved to New York, the nation's publishing center.
-
- For all of its exhilaration, life in New York was filled with unrelenting
activity. Parker produced up to ten finished assignments each month and
carried out the requisite social schedule that accompanied his success.
Though he enjoyed living the life that he portrayed, he sought a place
to work that would afford more space and less distraction. In 1938, he
moved north to Larchmont, New York, and a year later, the first of his
mother and daughter covers appeared in Ladies' Home Journal. From
1940 to 1955, the Parker family lived in Westport, Connecticut, which boasted
a community of noted magazine illustrators. There, he maintained his focus
on editorial and advertising assignments but also made time for music.
-
- In 1955, Parker, who suffered from asthma, sought a change of climate
and went west. After a brief stay in Arizona where he was "knee deep
in American Airlines ad art," he settled in Carmel Valley, California,
where he continued to paint and play music until his death in 1985. Awarded
the highest professional honors for his art, Parker was elected to the
Society of Illustrators' Hall of Fame in 1965 and received honorary doctorates
from the Rhode Island School of Design and the California College of Arts
in 1978 and 1979, testament to his extraordinary accomplishments and his
ongoing influence.
-
Checklist for the exhibition:
-
- Alfred Charles Parker (1906-1985)
- Woman Admiring Her Ring, c.1930.
- Cover studies for Ladies' Home Journal.
- Gouache and colored pencil on paper.
- Al Parker Collection. Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- John LaGatta (18941977)
- Tea Cup Girl, c.1930.
- Cover illustration for American Magazine.
- Charcoal and pastel on paper.
- Courtesy of the Archives of the American Illustrators Gallery, NYC.
-
- John LaGatta
- Girl with Palette, c.1930.
- Oil on canvas.
- The Eisenstat Collection of American Illustration.
-
- John LaGatta
- Three Bathing Girls, 1931.
- Illustration for Ladies' Home Journal.
- Oil on canvas.
- Courtesy of the Archives of the American Illustrators Gallery, NYC.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Perfume, n.d.
- Illustration for The American Magazine.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Every Other Thursday, 1935.
- Illustration for McCall's, November 7, 1935.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Standing Woman, c.1935.
- Sketches. Pencil on paper.
- Al Parker Collection,
- Department of Special Collections, Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- The Higher Law, 1936.
- Illustration for Good Housekeeping, October 1936.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Children in Tree, n.d.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Man and Women with Umbrella, n.d.
- Illustration for Woman's Home Companion.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Sketches, c.1935.
- Pencil on paper.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Self-Portrait Caricature, n.d.
- Ink on paper.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Woman with Polka Dot Blouse, 1938.
- Cover illustration for Ladies' Home Journal, July 1938.
- Watercolor on board.
- Collection of the Museum of American Illustration,
- Society of Illustrators, New York.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Daughter of Divorce, 1939.
- Illustration for Ladies' Home Journal, October 1939.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- The Handsome One, 1940.
- Illustration for The Handsome One by Winston Norman,
- The American Magazine, March 1940.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Pretty Penny, 1940.
- Illustration for Ladies' Home Journal, February 1940.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Mother and Daughter Swimming, 1940.
- Cover illustration for Ladies' Home Journal, July 1940.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Haddon H. Sundbloom (18991976)
- Only One Soap Gives Your Skin This Exciting Bouquet, 1940.
- Oil on canvas.
- Advertisement for Cashmere Bouquet.
- Courtesy of the Archives of the American Illustrators Gallery, NYC.
-
- Rolf Armstrong (18901960)
- Jewel in White Chapeau, n.d.
- Pastel on paper.
- Courtesy of the Archives of the American Illustrators Gallery, NYC.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Man and Woman, 1941.
- Illustration for Good Housekeeping, July 1941.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Couple in Restaurant, 1941.
- Illustration for Good Housekeeping, July 1941.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Embrace, 1941.
- Illustration for Good Housekeeping, March 1941.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Woman, Man, and Flamingos, 1942.
- Illustration for Good Housekeeping, October 31, 1942.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Mother and Daughter Skiing, 1942.
- Cover illustration for Ladies' Home Journal, March 1942.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- You're Always With Me, 1942
- Illustration for The American Magazine, July 1942.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Carol and Murray Tinkelman.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Oh, Michael!, 1943
- Illustration for Oh, Michael!, by Brooke Hanlon,
- Ladies' Home Journal, March 1943.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Women are Awfully Important, 1943.
- Illustration for Women are Awfully Important by Elizabeth Dunn,
- Ladies' Home Journal, November 1943.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Government Girl, 1943.
- Illustration for Government Girl by Adela Rogers St. John,
- Ladies' Home Journal, March 1943.
- Gouache on panel.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Government Girl, 1943.
- Illustration for Government Girl by Adela Rogers St. John,
- Ladies' Home Journal, March 1943
- Gouache and colored pencil on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Taps for Private Tussie, 1944.
- Illustration for Taps for Private Tussie by Jesse Stuart,
- Ladies' Home Journal, January 1944.
- Gouache and collage on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Mr. Andrews' Boutonnière, 1944.
- Illustration for Good Housekeeping, November 10, 1944.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- A Night for Dancing, 1944.
- Illustration for A Night for Dancing by Ruth Power O'Malley,
- Good Housekeeping, October 6, 1944.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Woman in Red, 1944.
- Illustration for Good Housekeeping, June 20, 1944.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Movie Poster, n.d.
- Illustration for Good Housekeeping.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Apple Orchard, 1945.
- Story illustration for Good Housekeeping, July 25, 1945.
- Gouache on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Ordeal, 1946.
- Illustration for Ordeal by Leon Ware,
- Ladies' Home Journal, October 1946.
- Gouache, colored pencil, and pencil on board.
- Al Parker Collection, Department of Special Collections,
- Washington University Libraries.
-
- Alfred Charles Parker
- Tell Me the Time, 1946.
- Illustration for Tell Me the Time by Marie Fried Rodell,
- Ladies' Home Journal, November 1946.
- Gouache on board.
- Collection of Kit and Donna Parker.
-
- M. Coburn Whitmore (19131988)
- A Score for Love, 1947.
- Illustration for A Score for Love by Jane McDill Anderson,
- Ladies' Home Journal, June 1947.
- Oil on canvas.
- The Sordoni Collection.