Al Hirschfeld\nBorn June 21, 1903 – January 20, 2003\nEducation Art Students League\n\nBorn in St. Louis, Missouri, Albert Hirschfeld moved with his family to New York City, where he received his art training at the Art Students League of New York. After his college training, in 1924, Hirschfeld traveled to Paris and London, where he studied painting, drawing and sculpture. When he returned to the United States, a friend, fabled Broadway press agent Richard Maney, showed one of Hirschfeld\'s drawings to an editor at the New York Herald Tribune, which got Hirschfeld commissions for that newspaper and then, later, The New York Times.\n\nHirschfeld\'s style is unique, and he is considered to be one of the most important figures in contemporary drawing and caricature, having influenced countless artists, illustrators, and cartoonists. His caricatures were regularly drawings of pure line in black ink, for which he used a genuine crow quill.\n\nHirschfeld started young and continued drawing to the end of his life, thus chronicling nearly all the major entertainment figures of the 20th century. During his eight-decade career, he gained fame by illustrating the actors, singers, and dancers of various Broadway plays, which would appear in advance in The New York Times to herald the play\'s opening. Though the theater was his best-known field of interest, according to Hirschfeld\'s art dealer Margo Feiden, he actually drew more for the movies than he did for live plays. \"By the ripe old age of 17, while his contemporaries were learning how to sharpen pencils, Hirschfeld became an art director at Selznick Pictures. He held the position for about four years.\n\nIn 1943, Hirschfeld married one of Europe\'s most famous actresses, Dolly Haas. They were married for more than 50 years, and had a daughter, Nina. Hirschfeld is known for hiding Nina\'s name, written in capital letters (\"NINA\"), in most of the drawings he produced after her birth. The name would appear in a sleeve, in a hairdo, or somewhere in the background. \n\nReaders of The New York Times and other newspapers prior to the time they printed in color will be most familiar with the Hirschfeld drawings that are black ink on white illustration board. However, there is a whole body of Hirschfeld’s work in color. Hirschfeld’s full-color paintings were commissioned by many magazines, often as the cover. Examples are TV Guide, Life Magazine, American Mercury, Look Magazine, The New York Times Magazine, The New Masses, and Seventeen Magazine.\n\nAwards\nIn 2002, Al Hirschfeld was awarded the National Medal of Arts.\nHe was an Honorary Member of the Salmagundi Club.\nHirschfeld\'s desk, lamp and chair were donated to The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts\n1986 inducted into the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame\n\nOnline Gallery \nhttp://www.alhirschfeld.com/\nhttps://www.fastcodesign.com/3020357/18-of-al-hirschfelds-greatest-drawings

Al Hirschfeld History of American Illustration