Альберт Хиршфельд: Мастер карикатуры XX века

American caricaturist (1903–2003)

Albert Hirschfeld (June 21, 1903 – January 20, 2003) was an American caricaturist best known for his black and white portraits of celebrities and Broadway stars in which he hid the name of his daughter Nina after her birth in 1945.

Al Hirschfeld was born in 1903 in a two story duplex apartment at 1313 Carr Street in St. Louis, Missouri, and moved with his family to New York City in 1915, where he received art training at the Art Students League and the National Academy of Design. He married chorus girl Florence Ruth Hobby in 1927; the couple separated in 1932 and divorced in 1943. That same year he married actress Dolly Haas.

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 before he moved to The New York Times. Readers 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. He also illustrated many books in color, most notably among them Harlem As Seen By Hirschfeld, with text by William Saroyan. He was commissioned by CBS to illustrate a preview magazine featuring the network's new TV programming in fall 1963. One of the programs was Candid Camera, and Hirschfeld's caricature of the show's host Allen Funt outraged Funt so much he threatened to leave the network if the magazine were issued. Hirschfeld prepared a slightly different likeness, perhaps more flattering, but he and the network pointed out to Funt that the artwork prepared for newspapers and some other print media had been long in preparation and it was too late to withdraw it. Funt relented but insisted that what could be changed would have to be. Newsweek ran a squib on the controversy.

Hirschfeld started young and continued drawing to the end of his life, thus chronicling nearly all of 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, and then in 1924 Hirschfeld moved to Paris to work and lead the Bohemian life. Hirschfeld also grew a beard, necessitated by the exigencies of living in a cold water flat. This he retained for the next 75 years, presumably because "you never know when your oil burner will go on the fritz." In addition to Broadway and film, Hirschfeld also drew politicians, TV stars, and celebrities of all stripes from Cole Porter and the Nicholas Brothers to the cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation. He also caricatured jazz musicians——Glenn Miller, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Dizzy Gillespie, Billie Holiday, and Ella Fitzgerald—and rockers The Beatles, Elvis Presley, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Jerry Garcia, and Mick Jagger. In 1977, he drew the cover of Aerosmith's Draw the Line album. Hirschfeld drew many original movie posters, including for Charlie Chaplin's films, as well as The Wizard of Oz (1939). The "Rhapsody in Blue" segment in the Disney film Fantasia 2000 was inspired by his designs, and Hirschfeld became an artistic consultant for the segment; the segment's director, Eric Goldberg, is a longtime fan of his work. Further evidence of Goldberg's admiration for Hirschfeld can be found in Goldberg's character design and animation of the genie in Aladdin (1992).

In 1943, Hirschfeld married German actress Dolly Haas. They were married for more than 50 years and had a daughter, Nina. In the Fantasia 2000 segment, the crimp of Duke the Builder's toothpaste tube contained a NINA in tribute to Hirschfeld. Hirschfeld's illustrations for the theater were gathered and published yearly in the books, The Best Plays of (for example, The Best Plays of 1958 1959). Additional collections of Hirschfeld's illustrations include: Manhattan Oasis, Show Business Is No Business (1951), American Theater, The American Theater as Seen by Al Hirschfeld, The World of Al Hirschfeld (1970), The Lively Years, 1920 1973 with text by Brooks Atkinson (1973), The Entertainers (1977), Hirschfeld by Hirschfeld (1979), Hirschfeld’s World (1981), Show Business is No Business with preface and endnotes by Margo Feiden (1983), A Selection of Limited Edition Etchings and Lithographs with text by Margo Feiden (1983), Art and Recollections From Eight Decades (1991), Hirschfeld On Line (2000), Hirschfeld’s Hollywood (2001), Hirschfeld’s New York (2001), Hirschfeld’s Speakeasies of 1932 with Introduction by Pete Hamill (2003), and Hirschfeld’s British Isles (2005). Hirschfeld collaborated with humorist S. J. Perelman on several publications, including Westward Ha! Or, Around the World in 80 Clichés, a satirical look at the duo's travels on assignment for Holiday magazine. In 1987, the United States Postal Service commissioned him to draw a series of postage stamps commemorating famous American comedians. He followed that with a collection of silent film stars including Rudolph Valentino, ZaSu Pitts and Buster Keaton. The Postal Service allowed him to include Nina's name in his drawings, waiving their own rule forbidding hidden messages in United States stamp designs. Hirschfeld expanded his audience by contributing to Patrick F. McManus' humor column in Outdoor Life magazine for a number of years.

On January 20, 2003, Hirschfeld died of natural causes in his home at 122 East 95th Street in Manhattan. He was survived by his daughter Nina Hirschfeld West, and his third wife, Louise Kerz.