# AIZ Political Photomontage (Heartfield)

> The political photomontage John Heartfield made for the communist weekly AIZ from 1930 to 1938, in Berlin and, from 1933, in Prague exile. Press photographs were cut, joined, retouched with airbrush and rephotographed into one seamless, believable picture that usually takes an opponent's slogan or symbol, most often a Nazi one, literally and, less often, raises a heroic emblem such as the clenched fist. It was printed full-page in single-ink photogravure between a short headline and a deadpan caption or quotation in plain bold sans.

- Period: 1930–1938
- Where: Central Europe
- Origin: Berlin, then Prague in exile: John Heartfield's full-page photomontages for the communist illustrated weekly Arbeiter-Illustrierte-Zeitung (AIZ), which Willi Münzenberg's Neuer Deutscher Verlag launched as A-I-Z on 30 November 1924 and made weekly from November 1926. Heartfield began working for it in 1929 (MoMA) and was a permanent contributor from 1930 to 1938; after the last Berlin issue of 5 March 1933 the magazine continued in Prague, where it was renamed Die Volks-Illustrierte in 1936. Some montages were also posted as large posters in Berlin in 1932–33
- Branch: Avant-garde
- Also known as: Heartfield photomontage, Arbeiter-Illustrierte-Zeitung montages, Antifascist satirical photomontage, AIZ photomontage
- Page: https://stylogeny.com/styles/aiz-political-photomontage/

## Use it with care

The montages turn swastikas and portraits of Nazi leaders against the regime; displaying Nazi symbols is restricted by law in Germany and several other countries outside contexts such as art, satire, education and history, so keep any reuse unmistakably critical and check the rules where the work will be shown. AIZ was also a communist magazine informally financed by the Comintern: before 1933 its montages attacked the Social Democrats as well as the Nazis, and in 1934 it devoted a special issue to seventeen years of the Soviet Union, so treat the style as partisan propaganda, and do not turn its literal, accusatory montage on named living people without checking defamation and image-rights law.

## How it works

- Make one believable picture, not a scatter of fragments: cut and join press photographs, hide the seams with airbrush and brush retouching, and rephotograph the paste-up so the montage reads as a single photographed scene, like the X-ray of Hitler's torso full of gold coins in 'Adolf, der Übermensch' (1932).
- Take the opponent's own slogan, motto or symbol literally and let the picture convict him: 'Millionen stehen hinter mir' becomes a giant donor's hand putting banknotes into Hitler's raised salute, and the old motto 'Blut und Eisen' becomes four bloody axes tied into a swastika.
- Read the page as a sentence: a short headline above the picture or across its foot, one central image, then a sardonic subtitle, motto or exact quotation of the person attacked, such as Göring's Hamburg speech under the Nazi family gnawing on metal in 'Hurrah, die Butter ist alle!' (1935).
- Keep the type plain and quiet so the picture does the shouting: a bold geometric or grotesque sans, centred or spread across the page width, as widely spaced capitals or reversed white out of the dark gravure, rather than rotated, scattered or mixed with other faces as in Dada.
- Print in one tone of photogravure ink, sepia, red-brown or grey-black on cream paper, and use airbrushed fades and empty backdrops to isolate the figure; treat the printed magazine page, signed 'Montage: John Heartfield', as the finished work.
- Answer the week's news: tie each montage to an election, a speech, a decree or a conference so a mass readership recognises the target at once, and now and then turn from mockery to a rallying emblem, like the fist filled with a crowd of raised arms on the united-front cover of 4 October 1934 or the fist on radio waves of 1937.

## Its design choices

Defining choices make the style, characteristic ones are usual, occasional ones turn up now and then.

### Layout & composition
- [Isolated object](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/isolated-object/) (characteristic)
- [Full bleed](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/full-bleed/) (characteristic)
- [Central symmetry](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/central-symmetry/) (characteristic)
- [Radial & concentric](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/radial-and-concentric/) (occasional)

### Space & hierarchy
- [Single focal point](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/single-focal-point/) (defining)
- [Extreme scale contrast](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/extreme-scale-contrast/) (characteristic)
- [Illusion of depth](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/illusion-of-depth/) (characteristic)
- [Layered information](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/layered-information/) (characteristic)
- [Generous white space](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/generous-white-space/) (occasional)

### Typography
- [Grotesque & neo-grotesque](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/grotesque-and-neo-grotesque/) (characteristic)
- [Geometric sans](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/geometric-sans/) (characteristic)
- [All caps](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/all-caps/) (characteristic)
- [Wide letterspacing](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/wide-letterspacing/) (characteristic)
- [Hand-lettering](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/hand-lettering/) (occasional)

### Colour
- [Monochrome](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/monochrome/) (defining)
- [Gradients](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/gradients/) (characteristic)
- [Light ground](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/light-ground/) (occasional)
- [Dark ground](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/dark-ground/) (occasional)

### Form & shape
- [Naturalistic depiction](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/naturalistic-depiction/) (defining)
- [Distortion & exaggeration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/distortion-and-exaggeration/) (characteristic)

### Surface & texture
- [Painterly brushwork](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/painterly-brushwork/) (occasional)

### Ornament
- [Ornament-free](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/ornament-free/) (characteristic)
- [Emblems & badges](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/emblems-and-badges/) (characteristic)

### Imagery
- [Photomontage](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/photomontage/) (defining)
- [Straight photography](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/straight-photography/) (characteristic)
- [Found & vernacular imagery](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/found-and-vernacular-imagery/) (characteristic)
- [Treated photography](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/treated-photography/) (occasional)

### Medium & production
- [Offset printing](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/offset-printing/) (characteristic)
- [Architecture & signage](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/architecture-and-signage/) (occasional)

### Tone & intent
- [Ironic & self-aware](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/ironic-and-self-aware/) (defining)
- [Agitational & persuasive](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/agitational-and-persuasive/) (defining)
- [Rebellious & subversive](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/rebellious-and-subversive/) (characteristic)
- [Playful & witty](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/playful-and-witty/) (occasional)
- [Communal & popular](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/communal-and-popular/) (occasional)
- [Utopian & idealistic](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/utopian-and-idealistic/) (occasional)

Avoids: Collage & layering, Eclectic mixing, Rotated & vertical setting, Experimental & distorted, Stylised figuration, Photocopy & distress, Comic & cartoon, Typography only, Full polychrome, Calm & contemplative, Luxurious & glamorous

Palette: #ede1c3, #c6a67c, #86603f, #4b2b1c, #40423b, #1e1a17

Typefaces: Bold geometric or grotesque sans capitals of the Erbar, Kabel or Futura kind, with round C and G, for the headline, stacked above the picture ('DER SINN DES HITLERGRUSSES:', AIZ cover, 16 October 1932; 'BLUT UND EISEN', 1934) or widely letterspaced across the foot of a spread ('KRIEG UND LEICHEN – DIE LETZTE HOFFNUNG DER REICHEN', 1932), Bold geometric or grotesque sans upper- and lowercase, often with a double-storey a, for the punchline, often reversed white out of the dark gravure ('Kleiner Mann bittet um große Gaben', 1932; 'Hurrah, die Butter ist alle!', 1935; 'Die Stimme der Freiheit in deutscher Nacht – auf Welle 29,8', 1937), Small sans capitals for mottoes, quotations and the printed credit 'Montage: John Heartfield' or 'Fotomontage: John Heartfield', Occasional brush lettering for a rallying slogan, drawn in ink and gouache and pasted up ('Alle Fäuste zu einer geballt', AIZ cover, 4 October 1934; lettering design JH 5656), The hand-drawn A-I-Z masthead: heavy slanted capitals joined by hyphens, printed in the same ink as the picture (front cover of 16 October 1932); in Prague by 1934 a plain 'AIZ' in heavy upright sans capitals (front cover of 4 October 1934)

Known for: 'Wer Bürgerblätter liest wird blind und taub: Weg mit den Verdummungsbandagen!' (Whoever Reads Bourgeois Newspapers Becomes Blind and Deaf), AIZ 1930, vol. 9, no. 6, p. 103: a man in Reichsbanner uniform whose head is wrapped in pages of the Social Democrats' Vorwärts and of Tempo, a jab at SPD readers (Getty Research Institute, 87-S194; Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung); 'Zum Krisen-Parteitag der SPD', AIZ, June 1931: a businessman with a tiger's face and a swastika tie pin above a quotation of the SPD deputy and trade unionist Fritz Tarnow, who said social democracy wanted to heal capitalism like a doctor rather than see it collapse; the Leipzig delegates are mocked as vets (Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung; German History in Documents and Images); 'Krieg und Leichen – Die letzte Hoffnung der Reichen' (War and Corpses: The Last Hope of the Rich), AIZ, 24 April 1932, vol. 11, no. 18, pp. 420–421: a double-page spread of a hyena in a top hat among the dead on a battlefield, the title in spaced capitals across the foot (Getty Research Institute, 87-S194); 'Adolf, der Übermensch: Schluckt Gold und redet Blech' (Adolf, the Superman: Swallows Gold and Spouts Tin), AIZ, 17 July 1932, vol. 11, no. 29, p. 675: a montaged X-ray shows gold coins running down Hitler's gullet; with Harry Graf Kessler's financial support it was posted as a large poster in the Reichstag election campaign (Akademie der Künste, JH 2261; original montage JH 524; Getty, 87-S194); 'Der Sinn des Hitlergrußes: Kleiner Mann bittet um große Gaben. Motto: Millionen stehen hinter mir!', front cover of AIZ, 16 October 1932, vol. 11, no. 42, made for the Reichstag election of 6 November 1932 (Akademie der Künste, JH 217; original montage JH 509; Getty, 87-S194); 'Der Sinn von Genf' (The Meaning of Geneva), AIZ, 1932: a dove spiked on a bayonet in front of the League of Nations palace under a headline MoMA translates as 'Where Capital Lives, There Can Be No Peace!' (MoMA, 1993 exhibition); 'Der alte Wahlspruch im "neuen" Reich: Blut und Eisen', AIZ (Prague), 8 March 1934, vol. 13, no. 10, p. 147: four bloody axes tied into a swastika inside a circle (Akademie der Künste, JH 1320; original montage JH 504); 'Alle Fäuste zu einer geballt, zeigt dem Faschismus eure Gewalt!', front cover of AIZ (Prague), 4 October 1934, vol. 13, no. 40, special issue 'Antifaschistische Aktionseinheit': a giant fist whose arm is filled with a photograph of communist and socialist youth rallying in Madrid, the slogan brush-lettered; the Art Institute of Chicago calls it a picture of inspiration rather than critique, exceptional for Heartfield (Akademie der Künste, JH 89; lettering design JH 5656; Art Institute of Chicago, 199245)

## Where it comes from, and what it’s close to

- Grew out of: [Dada](https://stylogeny.com/styles/dada.md) (1916–1924)
- Influenced by: [Russian Constructivism](https://stylogeny.com/styles/constructivism.md) (1917–1934)
- Influenced by: [Simplicissimus Satirical Style (Munich)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/simplicissimus.md) (1896–1944)
- Alike in its design choices: [Hipgnosis Photographic Concept Sleeve](https://stylogeny.com/styles/hipgnosis-sleeve.md) (1968–1983), 66% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [West German Conceptual Film & Culture Poster (Hillmann and Rambow)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/neue-filmkunst-poster.md) (1953–1990), 60% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [ACT UP & Gran Fury AIDS Activist Graphics](https://stylogeny.com/styles/act-up-gran-fury.md) (1987–1995), 55% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Post-Punk Record Sleeve (Stiff, Factory, 4AD)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/post-punk-sleeve.md) (1977–1990), 49% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [ECM Sleeve Aesthetic (Munich)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/ecm-sleeve.md) (1969–present), 49% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [NSK Retro-Avant-Garde](https://stylogeny.com/styles/nsk-retro-avantgarde.md) (1980–present), 47% alike

## Sources

- Akademie der Künste, Heartfield Online (catalogue of works): 'Adolf, der Übermensch: Schluckt Gold und redet Blech', sheet from AIZ, vol. XI, no. 29, 17 July 1932, pp. 675/676, Kupfertiefdruck (copperplate photogravure), 38 x 27 cm, JH 2261, with the note that the montage was posted as a large-format poster in the Reichstag election campaign with Harry Graf Kessler's financial support, https://heartfield.adk.de/en/node/3533; original photomontage, silver gelatin print with airbrush and brush retouching, mounted, 70.5 x 59 cm, JH 524, https://heartfield.adk.de/en/node/5754
- Akademie der Künste, Heartfield Online: 'Der Sinn des Hitlergrußes: Kleiner Mann bittet um große Gaben. Motto: Millionen stehen hinter mir!', front page of AIZ, vol. XI, no. 42, 16 October 1932, photogravure, printed credit 'Montage: John Heartfield', made for the Reichstag election of 6 November 1932, JH 217, https://heartfield.adk.de/en/node/4835; original montage JH 509 (silver gelatin print, airbrush and brush retouching), https://heartfield.adk.de/en/node/6692
- Akademie der Künste, Heartfield Online: 'Der alte Wahlspruch im "neuen" Reich: Blut und Eisen', sheet from AIZ, vol. XIII, no. 10, 8 March 1934, p. 147, Prague, photogravure, JH 1320, https://heartfield.adk.de/en/node/4940; 'Hurrah, die Butter ist alle!', sheet from AIZ, vol. XIV, no. 51, 19 December 1935, p. 816 (back page of the AIZ), Prague, photogravure, caption quoting Göring's Hamburg speech, reprinted in Lilliput, May 1939, JH 2919, https://heartfield.adk.de/en/node/3640
- Akademie der Künste, Heartfield Online: 'Alle Fäuste zu einer geballt, / Zeigt dem Faschismus eure Gewalt!', AIZ, vol. XIII, no. 40, 4 October 1934 (Sondernummer: Antifaschistische Aktionseinheit), Kupfertiefdruck, 42.2 x 29.8 cm, JH 89, with the note that the photograph copied into the arm shows a rally of communist and socialist youth in Madrid, printed in the same issue, https://heartfield.adk.de/en/node/3000; lettering design (Schriftentwurf) for the same front page, brush and ink, gouache, pasted, 21.5 x 33 cm, JH 5656, https://heartfield.adk.de/en/node/7354; 'Ein neuer Mensch – Herr einer neuen Welt', photomontage for AIZ 1934, no. 44 (Sondernummer: 17 Jahre Sowjetunion), JH 443, https://heartfield.adk.de/en/node/3309
- Art Institute of Chicago, A.I.Z. (Workers' Illustrated Magazine), 1929–1934, artwork 199245, https://www.artic.edu/artworks/199245 (record read through https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/199245): the monumental fist of raised arms is 'exceptional for Heartfield in that it shows a picture of inspiration rather than acerbic critique' and 'undoubtedly influenced by the work of Soviet photomontage artist Gustav Klutsis, particularly a 1932 election poster' of his own raised palm repeated
- David King, 'John Heartfield's Sticky Moments' (1992), https://davidkingdesigner.com/information/articles-interviews/john-heartfields-sticky-moments-1992/ (Heartfield in Russia from April 1931 to January 1932, looked after by his friend Sergei Tretyakov; got on well with Gustav Klutsis; first Moscow exhibition December 1931; photomontage seminars with Red Army soldiers; a cover for USSR in Construction)
- Getty Research Institute, Agitated Images: John Heartfield & German Photomontage, 1920–1938 (online exhibition), https://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/heartfield/ (Heartfield 'disassembled and rearranged' familiar press photographs; object labels, all copper-plate photogravure: Whoever Reads Bourgeois Newspapers, AIZ 1930, vol. 9, no. 6, p. 103; War and Corpses, AIZ 24 April 1932, vol. 11, no. 18, pp. 420–421; Adolf, the Superman, AIZ 17 July 1932, vol. 11, no. 29, p. 675; The Meaning of the Hitler Salute, AIZ 16 October 1932, vol. 11, no. 42, front cover; The Voice of Freedom in the German Night, Die Volks-Illustrierte, 21 April 1937, no. 16, p. 245); https://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/heartfield/about_aiz.html (AIZ 'financed informally by the Soviet Communist International or Comintern', headed by Willi Münzenberg; Heartfield hired as a regular contributor in early 1930)
- Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, 'John Heartfield: Collagen des Protests', https://www.fes.de/news/john-heartfield-collagen-des-protests (from 1930 a permanent AIZ contributor whose montages first targeted the shortcomings of the governing SPD; 'Wer Bürgerblätter liest…' shows a man in Reichsbanner uniform with his head wrapped in Vorwärts and Tempo; 'Krisenparteitag der SPD', Leipzig, June 1931, with the tiger-faced businessman and Fritz Tarnow's quotation)
- German History in Documents and Images, 'Zwei Fotomontagen des Künstlers John Heartfield (1931)', https://germanhistorydocs.org/de/die-weimarer-republik-1918-1933/ghdi:image-5321 ('Zum Krisen-Parteitag der SPD', AIZ, June 1931, and 'Die letzte Weisheit der SPD', both criticising the SPD)
- Museum of Modern Art, press release for John Heartfield: Photomontages, 15 April – 6 July 1993, curated by Magdalena Dabrowski, https://www.moma.org/documents/moma_press-release_327653.pdf (ninety-six original photomontages shown with their AIZ reproductions; Heartfield began working for AIZ in 1929, 'furnishing full-page photomontages nearly every month', and continued in exile; descriptions of Adolf, the Superman and Meaning of Geneva; the archive passed to the Akademie der Künste)
- Akron Art Museum, John Heartfield vs. Nazi Germany, https://akronartmuseum.org/media/exhibition/john-heartfield-vs-nazi-germany/ (composite images cut and joined from several photographs and rephotographed; Heartfield regarded the printed photogravure magazine page as the finished work; motto 'Use photography as a weapon'; Goebbels' recipe against the food shortage in Germany, AIZ 24 October 1935, 1979.25)
- German History in Documents and Images, 'Anti-Fascist Imagery: Hurrah, We're out of Butter!' (19 December 1935), https://germanhistorydocs.org/en/nazi-germany-1933-1945/anti-fascist-imagery-hurrah-the-butter-is-gone-december-19-1935
- Wikipedia (de), Arbeiter-Illustrierte-Zeitung, https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arbeiter-Illustrierte-Zeitung (first A-I-Z 30 November 1924 at Münzenberg's Neuer Deutscher Verlag; weekly from November 1926; Heartfield a permanent contributor 1930–1938; last Berlin issue 5 March 1933; Prague exile; renamed Die Volks-Illustrierte in 1936)
- Wikipedia (en), John Heartfield, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Heartfield (about 240 political photomontages; AIZ circulation up to about 500,000; rotogravure posters in Berlin streets 1932–33)
- Wikipedia (en), Simplicissimus, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simplicissimus (after the weekly dulled its satire in the First World War, 'the strongest political satire expressed in graphics became the province of' George Grosz, Käthe Kollwitz and John Heartfield)
- Sabine T. Kriebel, Revolutionary Beauty: The Radical Photomontages of John Heartfield (University of California Press, 2014)

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