Steinberg, Saul, 1914-1999

Saul Steinberg was a Romanian-born American artist and illustrator, known for his visual commentary on American life created for The New Yorker magazine during the 1940s through 1990s, as well as for his drawings, paintings, collages, and sculpture. Steinberg was born on June 15, 1914 in Râmnicu Sărat, Romania, to Moritz Steinberg and Rosa Steinberg (née Jacobson). Steinberg had one older sister, Lica Roman (née Steinberg), born a year earlier. During Steinberg’s childhood, the family lived on Strada Palas in Bucharest, where Moritz Steinberg ran a small printing shop that manufactured cardboard packaging, exposing Steinberg to art and graphics from an early age.

Steinberg graduated from the Liceul Matei Basarab secondary school in 1932 and spent a year in the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters at the University of Bucharest, before applying to the Faculty of Architecture where he was denied admission, likely due to the university’s Jewish quota. After experiencing increasing anti-Semitism in Romania throughout his school years, Steinberg moved to Milan, Italy in 1933 and enrolled at the Regio Politecnico Milan to study architecture. There, Steinberg met Aldo Buzzi and began a lifelong friendship. In October 1936, Steinberg began contributing cartoons to the Italian humor newspaper Bertoldo. In 1937 Steinberg began a relationship with Ada Cassola Ongari (1908—1997). Steinberg continued to correspond with Ada after his immigration to the United States and later supported her financially. In April 1938, Steinberg moved his cartoons from Bertoldo to rival publication Settebello and served on the editorial board. With the adoption of the Italian racial laws in late 1938 which barred Jews from professional fields and higher education, Steinberg was prohibited from publishing his cartoons, though he continued to publish drawings anonymously. The Italian racial laws also ordered the expulsion of foreign born Jews, giving university students an exception until they completed their degrees. Steinberg received his architecture degree in 1940 and began looking for ways to leave the country.

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