copyright 2000		John Heartfield was a German artist whose politically charged photomontages were banned in his home country during the Nazi regime. Heartfield was born in 1891 as Helmut Herzfeld. He changed his name in part as a way to protest World War I; he even feigned madness to avoid returning to the service. During the Weimar period he became a member of the Berlin DADA group. He used his collage work as a political medium, incorporating images from the political journals of the day. He edited "Der DADA" and organized the First International DADA Fair in Berlin in 1920. Sharply critical of the Weimar Republic, Heartfield’s work was banned during the Third Reich, then rediscovered in the Democratic Republic in the late 1950s. Since then, his art has influenced generations of artists and graphic designers. This section of the site contains three major components: Heartfield's art, Heartfield's life and world events. Heartfield's art contains detailed information about his photomontage work and examples of his art. Heartfield's life contains a theme-organized timeline of his life, highlighting his major events and connected to related pictures. The section of the site on world events is organized graphically by decades starting with the 1890s and concluding with the 1960s. The section on world events highlights major historic events during Heartfield's times.