Hy Hirsh

• Name — Hy Hirsh • Birth Name — Hyman Hirsh • Born — 11 October 1911 • Birthplace — Philadelphia, Pennsylvania • Died — November • Place of death — Paris, France • Spouse — Mae Agronowsky (1934–1936); Marie Gattman (1939–1961) • Known for — Photography, Film, Animation

Hy Hirsh was born in 1911 to Russian immigrants Max and Olga Hirsh. The family moved to Southern California in 1916 where Hy Hirsh developed an interest in filmmaking and photography.[2] At age 19 he began working in Hollywood and was employed by Columbia Studios from 1930 to 1936 as a cameraman and still photographer. He began side work as an art photographer in 1932 and had his first solo exhibition in 1935. In 1936 Hirsh was employed as a photographer by President Roosevelt's Works Progress Administration, and in 1937 he turned to avant-garde cinema, playing a comic role in the satirical experimental film, Even—As You And I.[3] In 1937, Hirsh moved to San Francisco where he became the official photographer for both the California Palace of the Legion of Honor and the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum, where he photographed artwork, processed film and made prints. He also discreetly used the museum's darkroom for his own artistic pursuits until he left the museum in 1954. Throughout the 1940s Hirsh worked as a photographer and cinematographer. He collaborated with Sidney Peterson on several films, and after moving to San Francisco, gave technical advice and assistance to numerous abstract filmmakers, including Jordan Belson, Harry Smith, Frank Stauffacher, Patricia Marx and Larry Jordan. He participated in the creation of a number of films before starting to make shis own abstract animated shorts in 1951. An avid jazz fan, Hirsh used the music of Thelonious Monk and the Modern Jazz Quartet, as well as African drumming and Caribbean carnival band to score his films.[4][5] His love of music became so intertwined with his filmmaking that it is now regarded as visual music. In 1955 Hirsh relocated to Paris and for a while to Amsterdam where he worked at a puppet animation studio. Commercial photography work for Vanity Fair, Elle, Réalités and other magazines enabled him to travel widely, and he spent some time in Spain. His home in his later years was Paris, France, where he continued his photography and to make experimental films. His shorts, Gyromorphosis (1956) and Autumn Spectrum (1957) won awards at the 1958 Brussels Experimental Film Competition. His films were sometimes accompanied by live jazz musicians and several projectors running at once. Hirsh's many talents led him to build his own optical printer, and he used then-new wire recording equipment to document live jazz. He also gained repute as a gourmet cook. He is alleged by film historian Willian Moritz to have produced some 15 documentaries for American television, though no documentation has ever been found. Hirsh died of a heart attack in 1961 in Paris. The opening credits of Walerian Borowczyk's short stop-motion film Renaissance (1963) include the caption "en hommage á Hy Hirsh" ("in tribute to Hy Hirsh").

Hy Hirsh had one child, Diane, with Mae Agronowsky in 1934. The family lived together for two years before Hirsh left, finding traditional family life too confining. In 1939 he married Marie Gattman, a dancer and actress with whom he shared an interest in left-wing politics as well as his bohemian lifestyle. The couple lived in Los Angeles for a short time before moving to San Francisco's Haight Street.

Hirsh's surviving still photographic materials, including hundreds of slides (from Paris, Amsterdam, Spain and his later European years), color prints and gelatin silver prints, are in the archive of Center for Visual Music, Los Angeles. The Academy Film Archive has preserved a number of Hy Hirsh's films, including Autumn Spectrum, Chasse Des Touches, and Scratch Pad.[6]

• Divertissement Rococo, 1951 • Eneri, 1953 • Come Closer, stereoscopic, 1953 • Gyromorphosis, 1954 • Autumn Spectrum, 1957 • Défense d'afficher ("Post No Bills"), 1958 • Chasse des Touches 1959 • Scratch Pad, 1961 (18fps with sound) • La Couleur de la forme, 1961 (non-original music added, original soundtrack unknown) • Etude Anatomique du Photographe, 1961 (presumed lost) Décollages recollés, 1960, unfinished, was not listed in Hirsh's CV of completed films, but exists in its unfinished state as a double, two projector film, 16mm, silent.[7]

• Even—As You And I (1937) with Roger Barlow, Harry Hay and LeRoy Robbins • The Cage (1947) with Sidney Peterson • Horror Dream (1947) with Sidney Peterson • Clinic of Stumble (1948) with Sidney Peterson • Film No. 4 (1948) with Harry Smith • The Lead Shoes (1949) with Sidney Peterson • Notes on the Port of St. Francis (1951) co-produced with director Frank Stauffacher

Hy Hirsh is recorded with the occupation cinematographer. Recorded with the occupation photographer. Recorded with the occupation animator. Recorded as photographer, animator and cinematographer.