Al Hirschfeld - Artist Of The Week - August 7, 2018

Al Hirschfeld photographed
by Carl Van Vechten, 1955

​This week's artist sends me back to my childhood. It sends me back to my teenage years at least when I was taking a cartooning class at Woodside High School. The instructor's name was Paul Buck.  Some of you from Woodside might remember Mr. Buck and the art department. 

The artist I want to highlight today is Al Hirschfeld. Hirschfeld drew caricatures and his style is quite unique. I was enthralled in my teen years. 

When we were at the play last week at the Noel Coward Theatre I saw a Hirschfeld drawing of Noel Coward on the wall. It brought me back to my teen years.

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​Hirschfeld would "hide" his daughter's name in most of his drawings. He used to put a number to the right of his signature to indicate how many times his daughters name, NINA, showed up in capital letters in the drawing. If there was no number NINA usually only showed up once or perhaps the drawing was done before she was born. 

One of the things you strive for as an artist is a unique style. Something that is your own. As Srini Rao might say Unmistakable. When you are the only one you have no competition. Herschfeld exemplifies that unique style. He was one of a kind. 

Hirshfeld's drawings were published in a number of publications including the New York Herald Tribune, The New York Times, and others.
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Though he is well known for his black and white drawings he also produced many full-color caricatures that were quite unique as well. 

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If you feel you'd like to take a trip down memory lane, back to an iconic artist of the 20th century, you could do worse than checking out Al Hirschfeld. He's not on Facebook or Instagram or any 

You can find his work at The Hirschfeld Foundation website or you could just search his name in your favorite search engine. 

He was truly the caricaturist to the stars and I want to thank him for this pleasant flash from the past.