John Heartfield: Pioneer in Photomontage

John Heartfield was born Helmut Herzfeld in Germany in 1891.  Heartfield’s reputation as an artist is built upon his innovative use of photomontage techniques and his unapologetic political engagement.  The political strain in Heartfield’s art has its roots in his tumultuous upbringing.  Socialists and political activists, Heartfield’s parents were convicted of blasphemy and fled Germany when he was eight years old to avoid incarceration.  Effectively abandoned, Heartfield and his siblings spent the rest of their childhood living with relatives and guardians.

Having shown an early affinity for painting, Heartfield was educated at the Royal Bavarian Arts and Crafts School in Munich, where he fell under the artistic influence of Albert Weisgerber and Ludwig Hohlwein, both commercial graphic designers.  Upon graduation, Herzfeld embarked on his own career as a commercial artist, designing jackets for books, including a selection of political writings by his own estranged father.  Heartfield subsequently studied in Berlin with artist Ernst Neumann.

In 1914, as World War I raged on, Heartfield was drafted to serve in a guards regiment in Berlin.  Fearful that he would be sent into combat, Hearfield feigned insanity and was discharged from the military.  As German nationalism intensified, Heartfield became more and more alienated from his government.  It was Germany’s adoption of the war slogan “May God Punish England” that spurred the artist to change his name from Herzfeld to the anglicized “John Heartfield.”  This was the first, but not the last, of Heartfield’s acts of public protest against the German government.  In 1918, Heartfield became a member of the German Communist Party.

After working for several years as a magazine publisher and film set designer, Heartfield joined the artists’ group Berlin Club Dada and became an influential figure in the Dadaist movement which was staunchly critical of Germany’s involvement in World War I, viewing the government’s values and behavior as barbarous.  Heartfield was an organizer of the First International DADA Fair in Berlin in 1920 and edited the Dadaist journal Der DADA.  In 1919, Heartfield organized a labor strike following the murders of Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg and was promptly dismissed from his position with the Military Educational Film Service.  Along with his brother Wieland and artist George Grosz, Heartfield founded a satirical political journal called Die Pleite.  Heartfield’s own artwork was severely critical of the Weimar Republic.  He also edited two Communist periodicals, Der Knuppel and Die Roe Fahne, which eventually published much of the work for which he became famous.  During this period, Heartfield married and had two children.