William Arthur Smith (1918-1989).

Born in Toledo, Ohio, Smith studied at the University of Toledo, and may have taken classes at the Art Students League in New York. Smith also studied in Paris at the l'Ecole des Beaux-Arts; he received most of his art training at the Theodore Keane School of Art in Toledo, Ohio, where he was a child prodigy, becoming professional at about age 13.

William A. Smith taught at the Grand Central Art School and at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY; lectured at many colleges in the United States and abroad. He served as President of the American Watercolor Society and President of the International Association of Art, the Unesco-affiliated organization of painters, sculptors and graphic artists of seventy nations.

Among his awards were the Gold Medal of Honor of the American Watercolor Society and the Society of American Graphics Artists Award for Lithography; the Winslow Homer Memorial Prize and the Society of Illustrators' Gold Medal Award for Advertising Illustration.

Works by the artist are in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art ad the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, as well as National Portrait Gallery and the Detroit Institute of Art.

Sources:
Archives, Saturday Evening Post, Curtis Publishing Company
Information courtesy of Sharon Smith Theobald, American Society of Appraisers, Senior Appraiser, Fine Art

Additional information courtesy of Kim Smith, the artist's daughter.