Artist Info: Al Hirschfeld was born in 1903 and as a teenager, he lived in New York City and studied art. After an early but short career with Samuel Goldwyn Studios (where he got his first art assignments doing ads) he moved over to Selznick Pictures and by 1921, at the ripe old age of 17, he was their art director. Six months in 1925 were spent in Europe and he returned to New York for a career as a painter. But on December 26, 1926 the sketch he had done of actor Sacha Guitry was published in the NY Herald Tribune. Within two years his theatrical drawings were appearing in five different New York newspapers, including the Times.