

John Heartfield (German, 1891–1968)
Photomechanical reproduction
Purchase, The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation Gift through Joyce and Robert Menschel, 1987 (1987.1125.8)
Heartfield published his political photomontages, many of which savagely satirized the Nazi regime, in the Arbeiter-Illustrierte Zeitung. In this widely disseminated workers' newspaper (500,000 readers in 1931), the often deceptively realistic montages appeared cheek-by-jowl with straight documentary photographs.
In this montage, Heartfield specifically links Hitler's electoral success with his courting of wealthy industrialists from the Rhineland. More generally, he gives pictorial punch to the commonplace idea that money fuels political power by implying that the Nazi salute is in fact a plea for cash.







