Washington, D.C. – based artist Betsy Packard spent a year in Italy where ideas of history, re-use, conservation, and record-keeping began to shape her work. She attended Tulane University (MFA Painting) on a full fellowship. While in New Orleans, Packard exhibited at Galerie Simonne Stern and installed a site piece for the 1977 inaugural exhibition, “Louisiana Environments,” at the Contemporary Arts Center there. Her work was first shown in Washington, D.C. at Gallery 10; later she was represented by Anton Gallery. Packard received Visual Artist’s Grants from the Maryland State Arts Council in 1988 and 1991. She was selected for Jane Addams Allen’s Visiting Critics Tour sponsored by Maryland Art Place, Baltimore, MD. Packard’s work has been shown most recently at The Shiva Gallery, John Jay College, CUNY, New York, and will be exhibited in June 2015 at The American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center in “Outliers: Kurt Godwin and Betsy Packard.” She has exhibited at the West Hubbard Gallery in Chicago, The Addison Gallery of American Art in Andover, Massachusetts, and in the Washington, D.C. metro area at the Washington Project for the Arts, McLean Project for the Arts, the District of Columbia Arts Center, Maryland Art Place, and The American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center. Reviews of her work have appeared in The Washington Post, The Washington Times, The Washington Review, The New Art Examiner, and Art Voices/South by writers Jane Addams Allen, Lee Fleming, Benjamin Forgey, Alice Thorsen, Richard Rubenfeld, Mary McCoy, JoAnn Lewis, Patrick Frank, Michael Welzenbach, and Michael O’Sullivan. Packard served on the WPA Board of Directors from 1985-1987. She works as a hairstylist at Aveda Bethesda.
