Hannah Höch

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Lore & Background

Hannah Höch was born Anna Therese Johanne Höch in Gotha, Germany. In 1904 she was taken out of the Höhere Töchterschule in Gotha to care for her youngest sibling, Marianne. In 1912 she began classes at the college of Applied Arts in Berlin under glass designer Harold Bergen, choosing glass design and graphic arts to please her father. In 1914, at the start of World War I, she left school and returned home to Gotha to work with the Red Cross. In 1915 she returned to Berlin, entering the graphics class of Emil Orlik at the National Institute of the Museum of Arts and Crafts. Also in 1915, Höch began an intimate relationship with Raoul Hausmann, a later activist of the Berlin Dada movement. Her involvement with the Berlin Dadaists began in earnest in 1917. Höch, as the only woman among the Berlin group, was singled out for her self-sufficiency, masculine presentation, and bisexuality. From 1916 to 1926, she worked in the handicrafts department for the publisher Ullstein Verlag, designing dress, embroidery, lace, and handiwork designs for Die Dame and Die Praktische Berlinerin. From 1926 to 1929 she lived and worked in the Netherlands, forming friendships with Kurt Schwitters, Nelly van Doesburg, Theo van Doesburg, Sonia Delaunay, László Moholy-Nagy, and Piet Mondrian. Höch, along with Hausmann, was one of the first pioneers of photomontage. Her affair with Hausmann was stormy; he refused to leave his wife, disparaged her art, and reached the point of fantasizing about killing her. Höch ended the relationship in 1922. In 1926 she began a nine-year relationship with Dutch writer and linguist Mathilda ('Til') Brugman, which they referred to as a private love relationship. In 1935 she began a relationship with Kurt Matthies, to whom she was married from 1938 to 1944.

Reader's Guide

Hannah Höch's significance lies in her pioneering role in photomontage and her feminist critique within the Dada movement. As the only woman in the Berlin Dada group, she faced sexism: George Grosz and John Heartfield were against her exhibiting at the 1920 First International Dada Fair, and only allowed her participation after Raoul Hausmann argued for her inclusion. Later, Hausmann wrote in his memoirs that "she was never a member of the club." Nonetheless, she held the title of "Dadasophin." Her work added "a wryly feminist note" to Dada's disdain for bourgeois society, addressing themes of androgyny, political discourse, and shifting gender roles. During the Third Reich, her work was deemed "degenerate art" by the Nazis, who put a stop to her 1932 intended exhibition at the Bauhaus. She kept a low profile in a small garden house in Berlin-Heiligensee. After the war, she continued to produce photomontages and exhibit them internationally until her death in 1978 in Berlin. Her house and garden can be visited at the annual Tag des offenen Denkmals. The 128th anniversary of her birthday was commemorated on 1 November 2017 by a Google Doodle.

Did You Know?

• Hannah Höch was born Anna Therese Johanne Höch in Gotha, Germany.
• In 1904 she was taken out of school to care for her youngest sibling, Marianne.
• She worked for Ullstein Verlag from 1916 to 1926, designing dress, embroidery, lace, and handiwork for magazines.
• Her relationship with Raoul Hausmann lasted seven years, from 1915 to 1922.
• The 128th anniversary of her birthday was commemorated on 1 November 2017 by a Google Doodle.