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JOHN HEARTFIELD (1891-1968) FORDERT: VERBOT DER ATOMWAFFEN! 1955.
23x16, 58 1/2x40 1/2 cm. Herausgegeben vom Deutschen Friedenstrat, Berlin.
Condition B+: sharp crease through image; restoration along vertical and horizontal folds.
John Heartfield was born in 1891 as Helmut Herzfelde. Emphatically anti-fascist, his strong political beliefs colored every aspect of his life and much of his art. In 1916 he changed his name to John Heartfield as a direct challenge to the prevailing Anglophobia that was gripping Germany during the First World War. After the war his focus became more political, and he joined the Communist Party in 1918. The first milestone in his accomplished artistic career ocurred in 1918 when, he, George Grosz and several other artists, founded the Berlin Dada group. In the 1920s he began creating photomontages (which eventually became his signature medium) for the covers of books published by the left-wing Malik publishing house in Berlin. He also began regular anti-fascist, photomontage contributions to AIZ (Arbeiter Illustrierte Zeitung) and produced powerful posters for the Communist Party. With the continued rise of the fascists in Germany, Heartfield was forced to flee and went to Prague where he continued his artistic attack on Hitler's regime. When Germany invaded Czechoslovakia Heartfield again was forced to escape, this time heading for England. In 1950 he returned to what was then East Germany, where he turned his talents towards designing posters for theatrical productions. Here the evil snake of nuclear war (his tongue a dollar sign, symbol of the capitalist nations and their pursuit of power), is being pulled away by a powerful arm. It is a powerful call opposing atomic weapons.