Dr. Gregory Conn, a graduate of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, is a pharmaceutical industry veteran and currently the co-founder and chief scientific officer of a biotechnology company commercializing novel immunotherapeutic technologies for cancer and infectious diseases.

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In the early 1990s Dr. Conn added to his art collection a life-size pastel portrait drawn by Eric Pape of Miss Alice Beers, daughter of insurance company robber baron William H. Beers, Esq. Finding only fragmentary information about the once-prominent artist Eric Pape available at the time, Dr. Conn began a decades-long study of the man and his art. Piqued by the tragic story and curious personalities he uncovered while researching the “Locked Studio” of Eric Pape and its hidden contents, Dr. Conn eventually amassed the largest extant collection of the surviving art of Eric Pape. He has undertaken the task of restoring and conserving the many Pape artworks he recovered, and has been donating them to public institutions worldwide for the appreciation of future generations.

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Dr. Conn is also the author of the biography “Eric Pape, Master of the Pageant,” in Illustration magazine #53, 2016, published by The Illustrated Press, and Eric Pape, eine Wiederentdeckung (a Rediscovery), which details the first comprehensive retrospective exhibition of Eric Pape art in a century. It was held at the Museum Kloster and Queen Cristina House Museums in Zeven, Germany, the town from which Eric Pape’s family emigrated to the United States. The exhibition was sponsored by Dr. Conn and included over sixty pieces of art from his collection that had not been seen publicly since the artist’s death. Dr. Conn is also author of "Eric Pape and The Players", a biography and catalog for the 2022 exhibition of works by Eric Pape for the theater at The Players in Manhattan. Dr. Conn is, like the famous subject of this site, a member of The Players.

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 Dr. Conn´s most recent book "Eric Pape in the New York Herald Tribune" collects material on Eric Pape´s work as a portrait artist throughout his career, including all 154 celebrity portraits drawn by Eric Pape for the Tribune during the Great Depression.

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