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A student of George Luks (1867-1933), the famous Ashcan School artist, Joseph Hirsch trained as a social realist painter. He was widely recognized for his work as an artist-correspondent depicting soldiers in World War II, and received several awards during his lifetime. Notably his painting, Nine Men, won fourth prize at The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s landmark exhibition, "American Painting Today—1950" (the Met’s Department of American Art had only formed one year prior). For art scholars, mention of this exhibition likely conjures up notions of the following controversy; eighteen Abstract Expressionist painters and ten sculptors (I guess “Irascible Eighteen” had a better ring to it) boycotted the show, claiming in an open letter to the Metropolitan, and later published on the front page of The New York Times, that the jury was too conservative and not accepting of “advanced art.” Despite the boycott, then Associate Curator of American Painting and Sculpture, Robert Beverly Hale, celebrated the show as a vital affirmation of democratic principles and cultural importance during a tumultuous period. The exhibition opened on December 7, the anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, and was a massive undertaking, with more than three hundred artists represented. Hale said, “The Metropolitan's gesture at this time, in a confused and heartsick world, is in itself an affirmation of belief in the importance of culture and a further affirmation of democratic principles at a time when faith is sorely needed. Artists will not be alone in recognizing it as such.” Despite his professional success, Hirsch faced political challenges. His career was defined by a commitment to the democratization of art and artist’s rights. Hirsch was a member of Associated American Artists, a gallery in New York dedicated to making original art and prints affordable to the public, and later a founding member of Artists Equity, an organization established in 1949 to protect the rights of visual artists. His involvement in the arts community and his perceived leftist views eventually led to him being labeled a Communist sympathizer during the McCarthy era. This political pressure followed his work to the Dallas Museum of Art, where Nine Men was on exhibition; Hirsch’s painting, along with works by Diego Rivera (1886-1957) and George Grosz (1893-1959), was moved to a separate room for visitors to consider their communist "influence" for themselves. Hirsch’s Self-Portrait with Model is an intimate work on paper that the artist created when he was 69 years old, just two years before his death. Ink and wash form a loose image of the artist at work. With Hirsch’s face obscured by the canvas and stretcher bars, the artist shifts focus to his hand, holding paintbrushes and an oil cloth, he emphasizes the artist’s tools—a motif he previously explored in a charcoal drawing, Artist’s Hand, and subsequent 200-edition lithograph run. Both works would later appear together in Kennedy Galleries exhibition of Hirsch’s “Recent Paintings and Drawings” in 1980. In Self-Portrait with Model, the artist appears intent on his work, leaning into the canvas before him, while a nude model stares at him from behind, hands on her hips with impatience. The theme of the artist and his model mirrors art historical works by Vermeer, Courbet, or an obscure favorite by Édouard Dantan, yet Hirsch introduces a unique tension in his work. This tension between the focused artist and the seemingly restless model offers a unique perspective on the pressures of artistic inspiration. She appears to demand something of him and his art.
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