art assignment

john heartfiled

Helmut Herzfelde was born in Berlin, Germany on 19th June, 1891. His father was a socialist writer and his mother was a textile worker and trade union activist. As a result of their politics the family was forced to flee to Switzerland in 1896.

After leaving school at fourteen Herzfelde worked for a bookseller in Wiesbadenl. In 1907 he became an assistant to the painter, Hermann Bouffier, and two years later became a student at the School of Applied Arts in Munich.

In 1912 Herzefelde started work as a designer in Mannheim for a year before moving to Berlin to study under Ernst Neuman at the Arts and Crafts School.

During the First World War Herzefelde began contributing work to Die Neue Jugend, an arts journal published by his brother, Wieland Herzfelde. He was drafted into the infantry where he meets George Grosz.

Herzefelde continued to contribute illustrations to Die Neue Jugend. While working for the journal Heartfield developed a new style of work that later became known as photomontage (the production of pictures by rearranging selected details of photographs to form a new and convincing unity). A pacifist and Marxist, Herzfelde, changed his name to John Heartfield in 1916 in protest against German nationalism.