Marc Simont at his drawing board in November, 2003.

Armed with his small “Scribble-In” brand sketchbooks purchased at a five-and-ten-cent store near the Academy, Simont drew in subways, bars, and other public places around town where, as he says, it was possible to work unnoticed, like a “bug in a fold in the curtain.” Sketching in this way became a lifelong habit. It was also while at the Academy, during the years 1935–1938, that Simont formed a close friendship with fellow student Robert McCloskey. In 1938, both men’s fledgling art careers were given a lift when an instructor hired the pair to assist in the painting of a series of murals for the Lever Brothers offices in Cambridge, Massachusetts. At about the same time, an acquaintance asked Simont to make a number of drawings to accompany a children’s book manuscript he was sending around to publishers. By this round-about means, Simont’s work first came to the attention of the juveniles editor at Dodd, Mead, and a major phase of his extraordinary career was launched.

None of the thousands of drawings contained in the two hundred sketchbooks Simont has compiled over nearly seven decades has ever before been published. What follows is a small (and altogether wonderful) sampling culled from the artist’s first, bug-in-the-curtain student days.

At first I was very bold when sketching people in public, looking straight at them without embarrassment. All that changed the day the man I was sketching across from me on the subway came over and ripped the page right off my Scribble-In book. The experience left me shaken, and I realized that if I was to continue sketching in public I would need to be less conspicuous.

During the summers of ’36 and ’37 I was an assistant to Jerry Farnsworth in his painting class in Provincetown. Mrs. Noyes (above), one of the students, would arrive in the morning in her town car. She would wait in her immaculate white dress while her chauffeur set up her easel and squeezed out the paints onto her palette.

This lady was just passing through.

Both these young women were students at the academy.

In the afternoon at Schrafft’s Restaurant on Fifth Avenue, tired shoppers would rest their feet and enjoy refreshments.

Playing checkers in Washington Square Park after dark was a popular pastime.

For two cents you could read about the Spanish Civil War.

A deck hand on The Normandie when it docked in New York after its maiden voyage.

When depressed, I made self-portraits in the hope they would exorcise the depression.

Bob McCloskey was mechanically inclined. (fixing his camera, above)

Capturing the essence of movement, be it in dance, baseball, or running to catch a bus, was always a challenge. These folks are doing a dance craze of the time — the shag.

All drawings by Marc Simont, circa 1935–1939. © 2004 by Marc Simont.

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