Page 86 - Studio International - March April 1975

next door had been Rossetti's authorities released him a few Uhlman was one of the sitters.
home. days later. All this is in striking No-one in England (and very few
When the refugees began to contrast to East German versions anywhere else for that matter)
arrive the Uhlmans addressed of this period of Heartfield's life took Schwitters at all seriously.
themselves to their peculiar according to which he lived very He was the perfect Dadaist. Even
problems. Diana became simply and spent several years in other Dadaists thought his art
secretary of an artists' refugee internment camps where he pointless and an insult to their
committee which collected and contracted the disease from which intelligence.
distributed several thousand he eventually died. After Uhlman was released
pounds to needy people while Uhlman remembers Heartfield from internment early in 1941 he
Fred founded the Free German as a very gentle man of little joined his wife and daughter in
League of Culture which many education and few pretensions. Essex where they had moved to
distinguished German exiles Whenever politics were escape the bombing. Downshire
joined including Kokoschka, mentioned, however, Heartfield Hill was left in the care of
Stephan Zweig, Berthold Viertel, became, in Uhlman's words, Heartfield and Klingender who,
Max Herman-Neisse and Franz 'a real killer. There were endless believing it to be the duty of a
Osborn. Uhlman soon left when political discussions going on bourgeois property owner to
he realized that the League had downstairs. But we never talked support the Revolution, sent all
been taken over by Communists politics with him because it the bills on to Essex. Heartfield
who had gradually transformed brought on epileptic fits'. was experiencing difficulties now.
it into a mouthpiece for party Uhlman himself was interned The period of the German-Soviet
views. Diana and Fred Uhlman during 1940. After a spell in a alliance had threatened his most
also helped to organize the now camp at Ascot (which turned out fundamental beliefs and the job
famous 1938 exhibition of to be the winter quarters of as a designer with Penguin'Books
modern German art at the New Bertram Mills Circus) he was which Uhlman had secured for
Burlington Galleries. taken to the Isle of Man which he him had evaporated into thin air
With the presence there of found cruel, distressing but also after Penguins came to the
Henry Moore, Ben Nicholson, bizarre and fascinating. Another conclusion that Heartfield was
Barbara Hepworth and Herbert book ought to be written about `unemployable'.
Read, Hampstead had been a the Manx internment camps. It Uhlman is scornful of
cultural centre for some years. was, among other things, the best Heartfield, who never got in touch
Refugees like Mondrian and university in Britain, staffed by after returning to Germany. He
Kokoschka made it a place of several Oxbridge professors and warms to the memory of Ludwig
even greater significance. experts and teachers from many Meidner, however, who lived with
Kokoschka, one of the first of the leading universities on the his wife Elsie in Camden Town.
artists to arrive in Britain from Continent. In his autobiography As an artist Meidner was violent
Germany lived around the corner Uhlman describes the problems and bursting with energy; as a
from the Uhlmans. He this created: 'What could one do man he was modest, quiet, absent-
discovered that his enormous if Professor William Cohn's talk minded and eccentric. He was so
reputation had not gone before on the Chinese Theatre frightened of the dark, terrified of
him and that the English were coincided with Egon Wellesz's the blackout and ill-equipped to
indifferent to his work. Uhlman, introduction to Byzantine Music? deal with London Transport, that
who secured Kokoschka's first Or Professor Jacobsthal's talk on Uhlman knew he would have to
English commission (a portrait of Greek Literature with Professor collect him personally if he
his brother-in-law) remembers Goldsmann's on the Etruscan invited him to tea. Meidner was
and the business collapsed. him as a man quick to exploit language? Perhaps one felt more one of the few people who
Life in France was not easy. every possibility of a sale, a inclined to hear Zunz on the actually relished internment. The
Refugees were frequently review or a commission, who had Odyssey or Friedenthal on the Isle of Man was clear of bombs
expelled and the atmosphere in already succeeded in making Shakespearean stage.' and danger. It was like a return
Paris became tainted with the some money before moving on to There were artists on the Isle to the womb and Meidner feared
stench of xenophobia. Uhlman the clearer and less dangerous of Man, too, the most improbable the prospect of release.
left for Spain in 1936. The same skies of Cornwall. of whom was Kurt Schwitters. After the war Uhlman's
year he met an English girl who The leading members of the Uhlman visited him in his tiny English reputation as a painter
was on holiday at Tossa del Mar. Uhlmans' Free German League attic room almost daily. grew and he established himself as
After a series of disheartening of Culture were all members of Schwitters, surrounded by a leading member of the London
circumstances (which included the CP: John Heartfield, the collages and sculptures made out Group. He scarcely exhibits now *
the loss of his passport and money 'inventor' of the photomontage, of porridge going green with age but continues to paint in the attic
in Marseille) Uhlman arrived in the weapon which he wielded so and stinking horribly, so studio of the house on Downshire
England and married the English ruthlessly in his campaign against impressed Uhlman with his Hill. The studio also contains the
girl, Diana Croft, who, because of Hitler; Francis Klingender, now abilities as a raconteur and bulk of a superb collection of
the somewhat narrow outlook of best-known for his influential eccentric that Uhlman can retell, African sculpture, the finest I have
her father, Lord Croft, was for a book 'Art and the Industrial word for word, lengthy jokes told seen in private hands. 'I live here
time estranged from her family. Revolution'; and Hans Hess, the him by Schwitters and can recite like a monk', Fred Uhlman told
Although he knew little of art historian and biographer of Anna Blume in a voice so like the me, 'these days I hardly even go
England and less of the language Feininger and Grosz. artist's that recordings pale in to exhibitions. People are terrified
Uhlman immediately plunged Heartfield had come to England comparison. of admitting that they like my
himself into the cultural life of from Prague after Germany had Schwitters, who had escaped to work. It's so unfashionable to see
London. Unlike a group of later invaded Czechoslovakia and he England from Norway with a anything in primitive or naive
refugees, from Hungary in 1956, remained in London until 1950 pair of his beloved white mice in painting.' He remains a rare
who, having been invited to study when he returned to the GDR. A his pocket, was, according to witness to a curious period in
at King's College, Cambridge, myth, propagated in the GDR, Uhlman, 'the best story-teller I Britain's recent cultural history
burst into peals of laughter when has grown up around Heartfield, have ever met. Although I found when in many ways Hampstead
they first saw their new home and and Fred Uhlman's version of him not especially intelligent, was the capital of the world.
were struck by the irrelevance of Heartfield's life in London actually naive, he had a wonderful
it all, Fred Uhlman was enchanted disagrees with all the others. head, like Gerhart Hauptmann's,
by England and especially by its Uhlman ought to know. but a clumsy, heavy body. He
more irrelevant aspects. He at Heartfield lived in the house on bothered not at all about his Top left
first associated with the Surrealists Downshire Hill as a guest for personal appearance, never Kurt Schwitters
in London, especially Roland five years, for much of the time seemed to wash much and wore Portrait of F. Uhlman
Penrose and E. L. T. Mesens. with Francis Klingender. His socks with so many holes that I 42x 120 mm
In 1938 the Uhlmans bought the guarantor (required by every suspect he often wore no socks at
house on Downshire Hill which refugee before entry to Britain) all. But I couldn't take him
was to play such a crucial part in was Ellen Wilkinson, the well- seriously as an artist. I don't
the lives of many refugees in the known Labour MP. When the think he could paint at all.'
next few years. It was a house with internment of enemy aliens was In the camp Schwitters painted
powerful artistic associations. The begun Heartfield had to leave portraits to make a little money.
previous occupants had been Downshire Hill. But his health They are conventional, *In fact his paintings are on
exhibition at the Trafford Gallery,
Stanley Spencer and his was bad (he suffered from nervous interesting only because they are 119, Mount Street, London W.1,
extraordinary menage; the house asthma and epileptic fits) and the so unlike his more famous work. until March 27.
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