About
Search for content
Drawing in Art Criticism..
I swear I’m still a “photographer,” I just need to process the film I shot this weekend.
Doing a fair bit of drawing these days.
meshscaffolding1-2 traced
grill1-1
stepshadow1-1
studio1-1
nudeplanter1-2
meshscaffolding1-2
(from an in-progress book of drawings and transfers)
Al Hirschfeld is known for hiding the name of his daughter, Nina, in most of the drawings he produced since her birth in 1945. The name would appear in a sleeve, in a hairdo, or somewhere in the background. Sometimes “Nina” would show up more than once and Hirschfeld would helpfully add a number next to his signature, to let people know how many times her name would appear. Hirschfeld originally intended the Nina gag to be a one-time gimmick but locating Nina’s name in the drawings became extremely popular. From time to time Hirschfeld lamented that the gimmick had overshadowed his art and tried to discontinue the practice, but such attempts always generated harsh criticism. Nina herself was reportedly somewhat ambivalent about all the attention. In the previously mentioned interview with The Comics Journal Hirschfeld confirmed the urban legend that the U.S. Army had used his cartoons to train bomber pilots with the soldiers trying to spot the NINAs much as they would spot their targets. Hirschfeld told the magazine he found the idea repulsive, saying that he felt his cartoons were being used to help kill people. In his 1966 anthology The World of Hirschfeld he included a drawing of Nina which he titled “Nina’s Revenge.” That drawing contained no Ninas. There were, however, two Als and two Dollys (“The names of her wayward parents”). (via Al Hirschfeld - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)
