Louis P. Hirshman (1905-1986) was an American artist known for his witty and imaginative use of ''
found objects'' for caricatures of celebrities and politicians and, in later years, for scenes of everyday life.
Unlike sketched or painted two-dimensional
caricatures
A caricature is a rendered image showing the features of its subject in a simplified or exaggerated way through sketching, pencil strokes, or other artistic drawings (compare to: cartoon). Caricatures can be either insulting or complimentary, a ...
, these
collages
Collage (, from the french: coller, "to glue" or "to stick together";) is a technique of art creation, primarily used in the visual arts, but in music too, by which art results from an Assemblage (art), assemblage of different forms, thus creat ...
, known as ''constructions'', are reliefs on glass-covered, framed flat boards created using common items and discarded junk, a genre which
Bostonia' magazine once dubbed the "Out-of-the-Ashcan School." His creations exaggerated the icons of his day, ranging from
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
to
Groucho Marx and President
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...
to Cuba's
Fidel Castro, revealing their essence with gloves, spools of thread, peanut shells, and chains.
Museum acquires ''Einstein''
Hirshman's most famous artwork was arguably his 1940 representation of ''
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
'', with the genius mathematician sporting a wild mop of hair, an abacus chest and shirt collar scribbled with the equation 2+2 = 2+2. In 1977, the piece was purchased by the ''
Philadelphia Museum of Art''.
Although his pieces often engendered laughter as viewers recognized the parts of familiar items that informed the subject as a whole, Hirshman – as well as colleagues—considered these representations serious works of art. In his last period, he shifted into caricaturizing scenes of everyday life and
archetypes
The concept of an archetype (; ) appears in areas relating to behavior, historical psychology, and literary analysis.
An archetype can be any of the following:
# a statement, pattern of behavior, prototype, "first" form, or a main model that ...
, all with his clever mix of found objects.
Birth and early life
![Albert Einstein caricature by Lou Hirshman](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/16/Albert_Einstein_caricature_by_Lou_Hirshman.jpg)
Hirshman was born in 1905 in western Russia, now part of
Ukraine
Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...
, to Jewish parents. Trying to escape hard times, his mother and father decided to take their nine children to the United States. After his father, along with several of Hirshman's older siblings, emigrated to
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...
, on the East Coast of the U.S., he found work in a
sweatshop
A sweatshop or sweat factory is a crowded workplace with very poor, socially unacceptable or illegal working conditions. Some illegal working conditions include poor ventilation, little to no breaks, inadequate work space, insufficient lighting, o ...
, saving enough money to reunite the family. In 1909, four-year-old Louis, the second youngest in the family, sailed to the U.S. through
Ellis Island
Ellis Island is a federally owned island in New York Harbor, situated within the U.S. states of New York and New Jersey, that was the busiest immigrant inspection and processing station in the United States. From 1892 to 1954, nearly 12 mil ...
with his mother and the remaining siblings to join his father. From that point on, except for a stint in the U.S. Army during World War II, he lived his entire life in Philadelphia.
As a child of a poor family, Hirshman claimed he would sometimes ease his pangs of hunger by drawing pictures of food, a skill that became useful for his later artworks that often contained what appeared to be perishables, such as bananas and spiders, but were actually created in his studio.
Training in art and brief career in filmmaking
Hirshman left school at the end of 10th grade and started doing art professionally in 1920. While little is known about his artistic activities during the decade, at some point Hirshman received a grant from the
Barnes Foundation
The Barnes Foundation is an art collection and educational institution promoting the appreciation of art and horticulture. Originally in Merion, the art collection moved in 2012 to a new building on Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia, Penn ...
, an art institute in Philadelphia
to study art in Paris, as well as in Italy.He also attended the ''
Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts
Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch language, Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appa ...
'' in Philadelphia. A lover of movies—the
Marx Brothers
The Marx Brothers were an American family comedy act that was successful in vaudeville, on Broadway, and in motion pictures from 1905 to 1949. Five of the Marx Brothers' thirteen feature films were selected by the American Film Institute (AFI) ...
and
Charlie Chaplin would later become subjects of his witty constructions–-Hirshman co-founded the
avant-garde
The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...
''Cinema Crafters of Philadelphia'' in 1928. In 1930, Hirshman, taking on the nom de plume of Hershell Louis, and several colleagues made the experimental film ''Story of a Nobody'', in which the camera takes the subjective view of an invisible protagonist. It has since been hailed as one of the first examples of avant-garde filmmaking in the US. The only copy, archived at the
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
in New York, deteriorated and was discarded in 1956.
In the mid-1930s, Hirshman joined the ''Graphic Sketch Club'', an art school in Philadelphia for local artists. While Hirshman had been doing oil paintings, he shifted toward drawing caricatures. In 1938, a premier ballerina,
Catherine Littlefield
Catherine Littlefield (1905–1951) was an American ballerina, choreographer, ballet teacher, and director.
She founded the Philadelphia Ballet (originally the Littlefield Ballet) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1935. It was the first American b ...
, incensed by an unflattering caricature, entered Hirshman's studio, slapped him on the cheek and tore up the drawing.
A new kind of caricature
Hirshman had already been experimenting with his constructions. His first major piece was in 1935, a biting caricature of the rich business magnate,
John D. Rockefeller
John Davison Rockefeller Sr. (July 8, 1839 – May 23, 1937) was an American business magnate and philanthropist. He has been widely considered the wealthiest American of all time and the richest person in modern history. Rockefeller was ...
, the co-founder
Standard Oil (coat and cap of crushed rock and a silver dime for an eye). By 1938, with an increased portfolio, Hirshman was approached by ''
Look Magazine''. The popular weekly journal ran a two-page, black-and-white spread featuring four of his pieces--''
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
'' with a house painter's brush for nose and mustache (Hitler was rumored to be a house painter) and a dustpan of manure for the shirt; ''
Harpo Marx
Arthur "Harpo" Marx (born Adolph Marx; November 23, 1888 – September 28, 1964) was an American comedian, actor, mime artist, and harpist, and the second-oldest of the Marx Brothers. In contrast to the mainly verbal comedy of his brothers Grou ...
'' with tomatoes for hair; Italian dictator ''
Benito Mussolini'' with a toilet plunger for a scowling mouth; and the ''Duchess and Duke of Windsor'', the well-off American divorcee
Wallis Simpson
Wallis, Duchess of Windsor (born Bessie Wallis Warfield, later Simpson; June 19, 1896 – April 24, 1986), was an American socialite and wife of the former King Edward VIII. Their intention to marry and her status as a divorcée caused a ...
with a pocketbook face, and milquetoast-timid former
King Edward VIII
Edward VIII (Edward Albert Christian George Andrew Patrick David; 23 June 1894 – 28 May 1972), later known as the Duke of Windsor, was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Empire and Emperor of India from 20 January 19 ...
with a slice-of-toast head and sunny-side-up egg eye. His work also appeared in several other publications, including ''
Vanity Fair''. In May 2015, the New York-based
Society of illustrators' hosted a lecture on forgotten caricaturists, which highlighted Hirshman's work.
Jobs and wartime
Married in 1939, the following year Hirshman began working at a commercial artist studio doing portraits, murals, cartoons and landscapes, as well as painting designs on plates. As World War II raged, he also
created posters for the ''
Works Project Administration
The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, in ...
'' (WPA), a federal program started during the
Great Depression, as part of the ''
Federal Art Project
The Federal Art Project (1935–1943) was a New Deal program to fund the visual arts in the United States. Under national director Holger Cahill, it was one of five Federal Project Number One projects sponsored by the Works Progress Administrati ...
''. In 1943, Hirshman went into the
U.S. Army
The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...
and was stationed in Texas, largely doing graphics duties, such as training aids.
Teaching career
After his discharge in 1946, Hirshman moved back to Philadelphia, eventually joining the faculty at the highly respected ''
Samuel S. Fleisher Art Memorial'', a free art school with evening and Saturday classes (now administered by the ''Philadelphia Museum of Art''). He was appointed faculty director in 1960, serving until his retirement in 1977.
There are very few known pieces created by Hirshman from 1950 through 1961. But in 1962, he produced ''Tap Dancer'', his first construction featuring an archetype rather than a public figure. Hirshman still occasionally did caricatures of politicians – pre-assassination President ''
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...
'' with a coconut forelock of hair (Hirshman put the piece in storage for many years after Kennedy's death); USSR leader ''
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and chairman of the country's Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964. During his rule, Khrushchev s ...
'' with a potato nose and garlic clove teeth; and Cuban leader ''
Fidel Castro'' with a beard of chain and a doughnut mouth holding a hotdog Havana. His last caricature of a public figure was a 1964 portrayal of a rat-like French President ''
Charles de Gaulle'' in profile with the foot part a large upside-down sock representing his large proboscis.
A shift in subject matter
During this transition period, Hirshman began using his found objects to mimic the world he saw around him—and the world in his head—a shift in direction that was to last until the end of his life. Largely unknown, this large collection of collages reveal an artist finding caricature, both humorous and serious, in a vase of flowers (''
Still Life''); animals (''Elephant'' and ''The Hunt''); loneliness (''Brooding Young Girl''); and dozens of other motifs. Anything could be anything – handcuffs as glasses (''The Psychiatrist''); tin can lids for tree leaves (''The Storm''); a pair children's scissors as crossed swords (''The Duel''); or halved peach pits for breasts (''Topless Waitress'').
Death
Hirshman died on July 26, 1986 at his home in Philadelphia. An unfinished construction was still on his ease
References
External links
Louis Hirshman' - Official website including gallery of Hirshman's artwork.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hirshman, Louis P.
1905 births
1986 deaths
American caricaturists
Works Progress Administration workers
Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States
Federal Art Project artists