CHILDHOOD + EDUCATION

John Heartfield was born Helmut Herzfeld in Berlin on June 19, 1891. Politics played a major role in Heartfield's life from an early age: his mother, Alice nee Stolzenburg was a textile worker and political activist, and his father, Franz Herzfeld, was a socialist writer. In 1899, Helmut, his brother Wieland, and his sisters Lotte and Hertha were abandoned by their parents who had to flee Germany to avoid persecution for their political beliefs. The Herzfeld children were subsequently raised by relatives and in institutions.

Herzfeld had a "gift" for painting at an early age, and in 1908 he studied in Munich at the Köngliche-Bayerische Kunstgewerbeschule (Royal Bavarian Arts and Crafts School), where he met to commercial designers who would influence him greatly: Albert Weisgerber and Ludwig Hohlwein.