Editing John Heartfield (section)

==Biography==

===Early life, education and work===
John Heartfield was born Helmut Herzfeld on 19 June 1891 in [[Berlin-Schmargendorf]], Berlin under the [[German Empire]]. His parents were Franz Herzfeld, a socialist writer, and Alice (née Stolzenburg), a textile worker and political activist.<ref>{{cite book| chapter= Biographical Chronology |title= John Heartfield| editor-first1= Peter |editor-last1= Pachnicke |editor-first2= Klaus |editor-last2= Honnef| publisher= Harry N. Abrams Inc.| location= New York| year= 1991}}</ref>

In 1899, Helmut, his brother [[Wieland Herzfelde|Wieland]], and their sisters Lotte and Hertha were abandoned in the woods by their parents after Franz Herzfeld was accused of blasphemy.{{clarify| And, what happened? Looks nonsensical as it is now. |date= March 2024}} His family{{clarify| Who, just the parents? |date= March 2024}} had to flee to [[Switzerland]] and later they were deported to [[Austrian Empire|Austria]]. When their parents disappeared in 1899,{{clarify| Again? |date= March 2024}} Heartfield and his siblings were left abandoned in a mountain hut. The four children went to live with an uncle, Ignaz, in the small Austrian town of [[Aigen (Salzburg city district)|Aigen]].<ref>[https://www.sartle.com/artist/john-heartfield#:~:text=His%20family%20had%20to%20flee,abandoned%20in%20a%20mountain%20hut Heartfield biodata], sartle.com. Accessed 16 December 2022.</ref>

In 1908, he studied art in [[Munich]] at the [[Königliche Kunstgewerbeschule München]] (Royal Bavarian Arts and Crafts School). Two commercial designers, [[Albert Weisgerber]] and [[Ludwig Hohlwein]], were early influences.

While living in Berlin, he began styling himself "John Heartfield", an [[anglicisation]] of his German name, to protest against [[anti-British]] fervour sweeping Germany during the [[First World War]], when Berlin crowds often shouted "[[Gott strafe England]]!" ("May God punish England!") in the  streets.<ref name=AMZ>{{cite book| title= John Heartfield and the Agitated Image: Photography, Persuasion, and the Rise of Avant-Garde Photomontage| first= Andres Mario |last= Zervigon| year= 2012| publisher= University of Chicago Press| isbn= 9780226981772}}</ref>

During the same year, Heartfield, his brother Wieland and [[George Grosz]] launched the Malik publishing house in Berlin. In 1916, he and George Grosz experimented with pasting pictures together, a form of art later named [[photomontage]], and which would become a central characteristic of their work.

In 1917, Heartfield became a member of [[Berlin Club Dada]].<ref name=AMZ /> Heartfield would later become active in the [[Dada]] movement, helping to organise the [[Erste Internationale Dada-Messe]] (First International Dada Fair) in Berlin in 1920. [[Dadaists]] were provocateurs who disrupted public art gatherings and ridiculed the participants. They labeled traditional art trivial and bourgeois.

In January 1918, Heartfield joined the newly founded German Communist Party ([[KPD]]).<ref name=AMZ />

===Interwar period===

In 1919, Heartfield was dismissed from the [[Reichswehr]] film service because of his support for the strike that followed the assassination of [[Karl Liebknecht]] and [[Rosa Luxemburg]]. With [[George Grosz]], he founded ''[[Die Pleite]]'', a satirical magazine.

Heartfield met [[Bertolt Brecht]] in 1924, and became a member of a circle of German artists that included Brecht, [[Erwin Piscator]], [[Hannah Höch]], and a host of others.

Though he was a prolific producer of stage sets and book jackets, Heartfield's main form of expression was photomontage. Heartfield produced the first political photomontages.<ref>"Heartfield in Context" by [[Maud Lavin]], February 1985</ref> He mainly worked for two publications: the daily ''[[Die Rote Fahne]]'' ("The Red Flag") and the weekly [[communist]] magazine ''[[Arbeiter-Illustrierte-Zeitung]]'' (''AIZ''; "Workers' Illustrated Newspaper"), the latter of which published the works for which Heartfield is best remembered. He also built theatre sets for [[Erwin Piscator]] and Bertolt Brecht.

During the 1920s, Heartfield produced a great number of photomontages, many of which were reproduced as dust jackets for books such as his montage for Upton Sinclair's ''The Millennium''.

It was through [[rotogravure]], an engraving process whereby pictures, designs, and words are engraved into the printing plate or printing cylinder, that Heartfield's montages, in the form of posters, were distributed in the streets of Berlin between 1932 and 1933, when the Nazis came to power.

His political montages regularly appeared on the cover of ''Arbeiter-Illustrierte-Zeitung'' from 1930 to 1938, a popular weekly whose circulation (as many as 500,000 copies at its height) rivaled any other contemporary German magazine. Since Heartfield's photomontages appeared on this cover, his work was widely seen at newsstands.

Heartfield lived in Berlin until April 1933 when the [[Nazi Party]] took power. On [[Good Friday]], the [[SS]] broke into his apartment, but he escaped by jumping from his [[balcony]] and hiding in a trash bin. He fled Germany by walking over the [[Sudeten Mountains]] to [[Czechoslovakia]]. He eventually rose to number five on the [[Gestapo]]'s most-wanted list.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.johnheartfield.com/John-Heartfield-Exhibition/heartfield-books-articles/david-king-book-heartfield|title=Heartfield's Escape From Nazi Germany|work=John Heartfield Exhibition|access-date=8 January 2017}}{{Dead link|date=June 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

In 1934, he combined four bloody axes tied together to form a swastika to mock the "Blood and Iron" motto of the Reich (''AIZ'', Prague, 8 March 1934).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.johnheartfield.com/John-Heartfield-Exhibition/john-heartfield-art/political-art-posters/heartfield-posters-aiz/blood-and-iron|title=John Heartfield Art Poster Blood and Iron|work=John Heartfield Exhibition|access-date=12 August 2015|archive-date=6 March 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160306055520/http://www.johnheartfield.com/John-Heartfield-Exhibition/john-heartfield-art/political-art-posters/heartfield-posters-aiz/blood-and-iron|url-status=dead}}</ref>

In 1938, given the imminent [[German occupation of Czechoslovakia]], he was forced once again to flee from the Nazis. Relocating to England, he was interned as an enemy alien, and his health began to deteriorate. Afterward, he lived in [[Hampstead]], London. His brother Wieland was refused a British residency permit in 1939 and instead left for the United States with his family.

===Postwar period===
In the aftermath of [[World War II]], Heartfield was denied his written applications to remain in England for "his work and his health", and was convinced in 1950 to join Wieland, who had been living in [[East Berlin]], [[East Germany]]. Heartfield moved into an apartment next to his brother's, at 129A Friedrichstrasse. However, his return to Berlin was seen with suspicion by the East German government due to his 11-year stay in England and the fact his dentist was under suspicion by the [[Stasi]]. He was interrogated<ref group=note>The English translation of the interrogation appears in the [[David King (designer)|David King]] book: John Heartfield, Laughter Is A Devastating Weapon.</ref><ref>[http://www.johnheartfield.com/John-Heartfield-Exhibition/about-john-heartfield-photomontages/tate-modern-london The David King Exhibit on John Heartfield Exhibition]</ref> and released having narrowly avoided a trial for [[treason]], but was denied admission into the East German Akademie der Künste (Academy of the Arts). He was forbidden to work as an artist and was denied health benefits.

Due to the intervention of [[Bertolt Brecht]] and [[Stefan Heym]], Heartfield was formally admitted to the Academy of the Arts in 1956. Although he subsequently produced some montages warning of the threat of nuclear war, he was never again as prolific as in his youth.

In [[East Berlin]], Heartfield worked closely with theatre directors such as [[Benno Besson]] and [[Wolfgang Langhoff]] at [[Berliner Ensemble]] and [[Deutsches Theater (Berlin)|Deutsches Theater]]. He created innovative stage set designs for Bertolt Brecht and David Berg. Using Heartfield's minimal props and stark stages, Brecht interrupted his plays at key junctures to have the audience be part of the action and not lose themselves in it.

In 1967, he visited Britain and began preparing a retrospective exhibition of his work, which was subsequently completed by his widow Gertrud and the [[Academy of Arts, Berlin|Berlin Academy of Arts]], and shown at the ICA in London in 1969.