Archie Boston

Archie Boston Jr. (born 1943) is an American graphic artist, and retired professor.

Born to an impoverished family in a small town in southern Florida, Boston's father was either a sugar cane sharecropper or a migrant worker tilling the sugarcane fields and later became a truck driver. His mother raised five children, including Archie, and worked as a babysitter. Boston graduated from Gibbs High School. National Defense Student Loans funded his education for the first three years and then a Disney Foundation Scholarship funded his final year of graphic design studies.

Career During his senior year at Chouinard, Boston worked as an intern at the Los Angeles-based advertising agency Carson/Roberts, one of the largest in the West. He went on to work at various studios, including Hixson and Jorgensen Advertising in 1965, and in 1966 he became an art director at Botsford Ketchum. among other designers. The proceeds from the resulting documentary funded a scholarship for design students in need.

Recognitions and accomplishments

1972 First African American president of the Art Directors Club of Los Angeles, where he served two terms. 2007 AIGA Fellows Award, L.A. Chapter of AIGA 2017 Boston and his work were featured in episode 4 of the multi-part series The Real Mad Men of Advertising Graphic Design: USA named him as one of 35 design pioneers. Awarded for his work in Art Directors Club Shows including New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles In 2018, Duke University acquired Boston's entire body of work dating from 1963.