Alvin Robert Raffel was born on December 25, 1905 in Dayton, Ohio. He was the son of Herman John and Pauline Louise (Kromann) Raffel. He studied first at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts and then at the Artist Institute of Chicago under F. DeForest Schook where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1933. Raffel also worked as a lithographer for Gartner & Bender in Chicago from 1925 until 1936.

Raffel returned to Dayton, Ohio in 1939 to accept a position as a lithographer for Reynolds & Reynolds. On October 5, 1940 he married Mildred G. Rosenberger. Shortly thereafter he accepted a position as Instructor of watercolor painting at Centerville High School and then as Instructor of drawing and painting in the School of the Dayton Art Institute. These many activities were interrupted by two years of service with the U.S. Army in 1943 and 1944.

Raffel maintained a busy exhibition schedule:

1933, 1934-45 - Ohio Annual, Dayton Art Institute: (1945, First Purchase Prize for Fellaheen)
1945 - Pepsi-Cola; Cincinnati Annual, Cincinnati Art Museum, OH

1946-48 - Carnegie Annual, Pittsburgh, PA

1955 - Magnificent Mile Exhibit, Chicago, IL
1958 - Provincetown Art Festival, MA

Memberships:
American Association of University Professors

Dayton Society of Painters and Sculptors

Raffel’s preferred media were oil and watercolor. He was well recognized for landscapes, urban views and cityscapes. Raffel died in 1987 in Dayton, Ohio.