Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
American, 1903-2003
For nearly 70 years, Al Hirschfeld created iconic caricatures of theater, film and television celebrities, capturing moments in time and documenting U.S. entertainment history in the process. Art historian Lloyd Goodrich called Hirschfeld “one of the few masters of graphic humor.” "New York Times" art critic John Russell dubbed him “the Fred Astaire of pen and ink.” Brendan Gill of "The New Yorker" stated, “To be a star on Broadway is to be drawn by Hirschfeld.” And many performers believed that, regardless of any other accolades they might achieve, “if Al Hirschfeld hasn’t drawn you, you don’t exist.”
Hirschfeld began his career as a political cartoonist and became a theater caricaturist for "The New York Times" in 1925. He began creating his pure line drawings on a trip to Bali in the 1930s, and, over the course of his career, mastered the technique of using lines to capture the spirit and personality of his subjects. Hidden in each drawing is his daughter’s name, Nina, and so many people became obsessed with finding all of the Nina’s, that he developed a system of noting the number of Nina’s in each work next to his signature. In addition to "The New Yorker" and "The New York Times," Hirschfeld’s drawings appeared on playbills and posters as well as in advertisements. As a result of his work, he earned two Tony awards for lifetime achievement in theater and had a Broadway theater renamed in his honor.
to
2
Overall Width
to
Overall Height
to
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
96
280
273
150
134
2
Artist: Albert Al Hirschfeld
Al Hirschfeld "Beat the Band" New York Times Broadway Theatre Illustration 1940s
By Albert Al Hirschfeld
Located in New York, NY
Al Hirschfeld (1903-2003)
"Beat the Band"
22 x 26 1/2 inches
ink on board
published in The New York Times, October 11, 1942
The unframed work comes directly from the Al Hirschfeld F...
Category
1940s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Ink, Board
Al Hirschfeld "Art Week" NYC illustration New York Times poster design 1940
By Albert Al Hirschfeld
Located in New York, NY
Poster design for National Art Week, November, 1940. In collaboration the Al Hirschfeld Foundation
Al Hirschfeld’s drawings stand as one of the most innovative efforts in establishi...
Category
1940s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Mixed Media
Related Items
Circus Rider, Acrobat
By Simka Simkhovitch
Located in Greenwich, CT
Simkhovitch was a celebrated artist in New York City from the 1920's through the 1940's. Life Magazine did a story on him and he was having great success in the New York Galleries. ...
Category
1920s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Graphite
"Lobstermen in Gloucester, Mass." Lionel Reiss WPA Social Realism Fishermen
By Lionel S. Reiss
Located in New York, NY
Lionel S. Reiss (1894 - 1988)
Lobstermen in Gloucester, Massachusetts, circa 1943
Watercolor on paper
Sight 17 1/2 x 23 inches
Signed lower left
Provenance:
Private Collection, Las Vegas, Nevada
In describing his own style, Lionel Reiss wrote, “By nature, inclination, and training, I have long since recognized the fact that...I belong to the category of those who can only gladly affirm the reality of the world I live in.” Reiss’s subject matter was wide-ranging, including gritty New York scenes, landscapes of bucolic Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and seascapes around Gloucester, Massachusetts. However, it was as a painter of Jewish life—both in Israel and in Europe before World War II—that Reiss excelled. I.B. Singer, the Nobel Prize winner for Literature, noted that Reiss was “essentially an artist of the nineteenth century, and because of this he had the power and the courage to tell visually the story of a people.”
Although Reiss was born in Jaroslaw, Poland, his family immigrated to the United States in 1898 when he was four years old. Reiss's family settled on New York City’s Lower East Side and he lived in the city for most of his life. Reiss attended the Art Students League and then worked as a commercial artist for newspapers and publishers. As art director for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he supposedly created the studio’s famous lion logo.
After World War I, Reiss became fascinated with Jewish life in the ‘Old World.’ In 1921 he left his advertising work and spent the next ten years traveling in Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. Like noted Jewish photographers Alter Kacyzne and Roman Vishniac, Reiss depicted Jewish life in Poland prior to World War II. He later wrote, “My trip encompassed three main objectives: to make ethnic studies of Jewish types wherever I traveled; to paint and draw Jewish life, as I saw it and felt it, in all aspects; and to round out my work in Israel.”
In Europe, Reiss recorded quotidian scenes in a variety of media and different settings such as Paris, Amsterdam, the Venice ghetto, the Jewish cemetery in Prague, and an array of shops, synagogues, streets, and marketplaces in the Jewish quarters of Warsaw, Lodz, Krakow, Lublin, Vilna, Ternopil, and Kovno. He paid great attention to details of dress, hair, and facial features, and his work became noted for its descriptive quality.
A selection of Reiss’s portraits appeared in 1938 in his book My Models Were Jews. In this book, published on the eve of the Holocaust, Reiss argued that there was “no such thing as a ‘Jewish race’.” Instead, he claimed that the Jewish people were a cultural group with a great deal of diversity within and between Jewish communities around the world. Franz Boas...
Category
1940s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Watercolor
Mid Century Mazatlan Beach Catamaran Figurative Landscape Watercolor
By William A. Corbett
Located in Soquel, CA
Vibrant figurative seascape of a beach in Mazatlan, Mexico with several figures and a catamaran reflecting beautifully in the shallow water by William A. Corbett (American. 1914-1960). Titled "Beach- Mazatlan" on verso. Signed "William Corbett" in lower left corner. Presented in a simple wood frame, with a double mat of off-white silk and royal blue with plexiglass. Image size: 22”H x 14.75”L
William A. Corbett began drawing at an early age. He constructed signs and displays for theaters and nightclubs around Pittsburg. He studied art with Vincent Nesbert at the Pittsburg Art Institute and with Robert Gwathmoy, Roy Hilton, and Robert Laper at the Carnegie Institute of Technology. He also studied painting and sculpture at the Louisville Art Center. Corbett was in the Army Engineers at Fort Knox, Kentucky where he studied, practiced, and had exhibits with army artists there from 1941-1943. He was very much interested in materials and technique, content and style in painting. His favorite Artists were El Greco, Leonardo, Rembrandt, Renoir, Burchfield, and Andrew Wyeth, Jr. He studied two years at Boston museum School with Karl Zerbe, Daivid Aronson and others. He later designed and did art work for General Outdoor Advertising Co. In 1943, he married Ruth Osborne of Louisville and they had one son, Michael. In 1951 he moved to Fort Lauderdale, Florida with his family.
Exhibitions:
Army Art Show--- 1st Prize in Landscape, 1942
Kentucky & southern Indiana Exhibition-- Honorable
mentions for Fisherman's Curse 1949, Don Q...
Category
1960s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Watercolor
H 27.25 in W 20.25 in D 0.75 in
Barnyard Chat
By John B. Lear
Located in New York, NY
Graphite on paper
Signed and dated, l.r.
13.5 x 10.5 inches, sheet
21.25 x 17.25 inches, frame
This drawing is offered by ClampArt, located in New York City.
John Lear is an America...
Category
1990s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Graphite
Two Nudes Figure Study
By Michael William Eggleston
Located in Soquel, CA
Figure study drawing with two nudes by Michael William Eggleston (American, 20th Century). Signed with the initials "MWE" in the lower right co...
Category
Late 20th Century American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Gouache, Pen
"Self Portrait / Sketch on verso" Robert Henri, Ashcan Self-Portrait Work
By Robert Henri
Located in New York, NY
Robert Henri
Self Portrait / Sketch on verso
Estate stamped lower right
Ink on paper, graphite on paper
12 1/2 x 8 inches
Born Robert Henry Cozad in Cincinnati, Ohio, Robert Henri became one of the leading personalities in American art, known for his teaching skills, ethnic portraits, especially spirited children, and insistence that artists should adhere to social realism and give rein to their own artistic instincts.
During his growing up years, he lived between Cincinnati and Cozad, Nebraska, founded by his father John Jackson Cozad, a gambler and real estate promoter. When Robert was about 10 years old, his family moved to Cozad in Dawson County. Tension existed between John Cozad and the established ranchers who resented development, and a rancher attacked Cozad, who in self defense shot the man to death.
Fearing for his life, he, his wife and two sons sneaked out of town and re convened in Atlantic City where they disguised their identity by taking other names. The father was later cleared of the charge, but he changed his name to Richard H. Lee, and passed his two sons off as adopted children named Frank Southern and Robert Henri. Robert chose a variation of his middle name to rhyme with "buckeye" to symbolize his Ohio roots. From Atlantic City, as a young man, he attended boarding school in New York City.
He, having shown early art talent, studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts as a student of Thomas Anschutz and Thomas Hovenden...
Category
Early 1900s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Ink
"Head Em Home", Mid Century Cowboy on Horse Western Figurative Landscape
By Stanley M. Long
Located in Soquel, CA
Mid Century figurative landscape of a cowboy on his horse at sundown titled "Head Em Home" by Stanley M. Long (American, 1892-1972). Signed “Stanley M. Long” in bottom right corner. Displayed in a simple wood frame and off-white mat with glass. Image size: 22.75”H x 30.25”L. Frame is 1.5" deep.
Stanley M. Long was a watercolorist who was born in Oakland, CA on May 4, 1892. He spent his childhood on a ranch in Napa where he broke wild horses. He began sketching when quite young and at age 15 enrolled at the San Francisco Institute of Art. He continued at the California College of Arts and Crafts, where he was awarded a scholarship for further study at Académie Julian in Paris.
Long served in the camouflage corps in both world wars. Long taught art in San Francisco at Mission High School and for 17 years at Polytechnic High School. His western illustrations were featured in Sunset Magazine and the Los Angeles Times. Having worked with horses all his life, they were to become the main theme of his paintings.
Member: Society of Western Artists, Napa Valley Art...
Category
1950s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Watercolor
H 29 in W 37.25 in D 1 in
1930s Nude Figure Study
Located in Soquel, CA
Gorgeous 1930s figure drawing of a seated female nude by student of Lee Fritz Randolph (American, 1880-1956), 1937. Signed "Randolph," "C.S.F.A." for California School of Fine Art and dated "6/28/37" upper right. "C.S.F.A" and "6/28/37" lower right. Unframed. Image size, 25"H x 10"L. We believe a student of Lee Randolph...
Category
1930s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Charcoal, Paper, Pencil
Mid-Century Cottage in the Woods Landscape Watercolor
By Joseph Yeager
Located in Soquel, CA
Charming mid century watercolor landscape of a cottage in the woods, executed with phenomenal attention to detail, by Joseph Yeager (early-mid 20th Century) on heavy bond watercolor paper with ragged edges. Signed "Joe Yeager...
Category
Mid-20th Century American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Watercolor
H 22.75 in W 30.25 in D 0.03 in
Large Watercolour of Pleasure Boats Moored on the River in Florida by USA Artist
Located in Preston, GB
Large Watercolour of Pleasure Boats Moored on the River in Florida by USA Artist David Coolidge AWS (American 20th-21st Century)
Art measures 40 x 30 i...
Category
Late 20th Century American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, Watercolor
The Illustrator's Workroom at The San Francisco Call, Late 19th C. Illustration
By Adolph Methfessel
Located in Soquel, CA
Skillful late 19th century realist drawing of illustration Newspaper artists at work at the Republican National Convention by Adolph Methfessel (American, 1876-1912)., c.1898. This p...
Category
Early 1900s American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Paper, India Ink
H 14.75 in W 20 in D 0.75 in
La Loire
Located in Middletown, NY
Pen and black ink on watermarked Ingres laid paper, 9 1/4 x 12 1/4 inches (234 x 310 mm), signed, dated and titled in brown ink, and initialed and titled in black ink in the lower right corner. Light to moderate age tone and mat tone, and with the signature and notations in brown ink having become quite attenuated, although legible. Presented in a basic black wood frame with a label from the Country Art...
Category
Mid-20th Century American Realist Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Ink, Handmade Paper, Pen
Previously Available Items
Rare Edward Fields "Geisha with Fan" Al Hirschfeld Tapestry Rug
By Albert Al Hirschfeld
Located in Surfside, FL
Very Rare Hand Woven Wool Tapestry Rug Carpet produced by the Edward Fields workshops. This was written up in an article in New York magazine in the 1970s. (this is a pile weave not a flat weave like an Aubusson.) From Hirschfeld's Japanese Kabuki Theatre series; Signed EF and Hirschfeld
Albert Al Hirschfeld, American (1903 - 2003) was born in St. Louis in 1903. The family moved forthwith to New York. Soon he was enrolled at the Art Student's League. Hirschfeld has never had to convince anyone that he's a genius; it has always been apparent. 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 and then in 1924 he moved to Paris to work, lead the Bohemian life, and grow a beard. In 1943, Hirschfeld married one of Europe's most famous actresses, the late Dolly Haas. They were married for more than 50 years—in addition, they produced Nina. Nina is their daughter, and Hirschfeld has engaged in the "harmless insanity," as he calls it, of hiding her name at least once in each of his drawings.
It's interesting, I think, that although Hirschfeld was initially attracted to sculpture and painting, this gave way to his passion for pure line."Sculpture, he once said to me, is a drawing you trip over in the dark.
I believe that Hirschfeld's devotion to line comes from yet a more fundamental aesthetic - his respect for absolute simplicity. "When I'm rushed I do a complicated drawing. When I have the time, I do a simple one." In 1991, Al Hirschfeld became the first artist in history to have his name on a U.S. Postage Stamp Booklet when the United States Postal Service released the five stamps they commissioned Hirschfeld to design. The stamps portray Laurel & Hardy, Jack Benny, Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy...
Category
20th Century Modern Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
Materials
Wool
Albert Al Hirschfeld mixed media for sale on 1stDibs.
Find a wide variety of authentic Albert Al Hirschfeld mixed media available for sale on 1stDibs. You can also browse by medium to find art by Albert Al Hirschfeld in board, ink, mixed media and more. Not every interior allows for large Albert Al Hirschfeld mixed media, so small editions measuring 20 inches across are available. Albert Al Hirschfeld mixed media prices can differ depending upon medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $15,000 and tops out at $15,000, while the average work can sell for $15,000.
Questions About Albert Al Hirschfeld Mixed Media
- 1stDibs ExpertJanuary 19, 2025Al Hirschfeld was famous for his work as an artist. For nearly 70 years, he created iconic caricatures of theater, film and television celebrities, capturing moments in time and documenting U.S. entertainment history in the process. His drawings appeared on playbills and posters as well as in advertisements. As a result of his work, he earned two Tony awards for lifetime achievement in theater and had a Broadway theater renamed in his honor. Explore a range of Al Hirschfeld art on 1stDibs.
Recently Viewed
View AllMore Albert Al Hirschfeld Art
Albert Al Hirschfeld Prints and Multiples
Albert Al Hirschfeld Drawings and Watercolor Paintings
Albert Al Hirschfeld Figurative Prints
Albert Al Hirschfeld Portrait Prints
Albert Al Hirschfeld Figurative Drawings and Watercolors
Albert Al Hirschfeld Portrait Drawings and Watercolors
Albert Al Hirschfeld Interior Drawings and Watercolors
Albert Al Hirschfeld Abstract Drawings and Watercolors