Adolf Hoffmeister

Adolf Hoffmeister (15 August 1902 – 24 July 1973) was a Czechoslovak writer, publicist, playwright, painter, draughtsman, scenographer, cartoonist, translator, diplomat, lawyer, university professor and traveller. During the war, he served as editor of the radio station Voice of America, and after the war the Czechoslovak ambassador to France. In 1951 he became a professor at the Academy of Arts and Crafts in Prague. He was a founding member of Devětsil (1920), chairman of the Union of Czechoslovak Visual Artists (1964–1967, 1968–1969), and a member of International Association of Art Critics. Hoffmeister represented Czechoslovakia at UNESCO, the PEN Club and other international organizations. Hoffmeister's career was ended by the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968 and the subsequent occupation.

Life

Youth, studies

He was born into the family of the Prague lawyer JUDr. Adolf Hoffmeister (1870–1936) and his wife Marie, née Schnöbling (1881–1967). He grew up in a cultivated intellectual environment – his uncles were the composer and teacher Karel Hoffmeister and the classical philologist Ferdinand Hoffmeister. From 1914 the Hoffmeister family lived in the cubist house Diamant at the corner of Spálená Street No. 4, which was commissioned by JUDr Adolf Hoffmeister.

In 1912–1921 he studied at the Masaryk Ist State Czechoslovak Real Gymnasium in Křemencova Street in Prague, where most of the future members of the avant-garde group Devětsil met. When Devětsil was founded on October 5, 1920, Adolf Hoffmeister became its youngest member and its managing director. In 1919 he met the Čapek brothers and S.K. Neumann. After graduating from high school, he continued his studies at the Faculty of Law of Charles University in Prague, which he completed in 1925 with a doctorate (JUDr). In the summer semester of 1924 he studied Egyptology at Cambridge University. He joined his father's law firm as a law clerk, becoming one of three partners between 1930 and 1939. After Hitler came to power, this law firm represented a number of German exiles, including Thomas Mann.

From 1917 onwards, he wrote poems, which he initially published in magazines under various pseudonyms, and devoted himself to drawing and linocutting. In 1922, he published his first book of poems and prose, participated with seventeen works in the spring exhibition of the Devětsil, and in the same year made a trip to Paris. He became acquainted with Man Ray and Ossip Zadkine. He became a member of the ''New Group'', which split from the Devětsil, and exhibited with it at the Mánes Hall in 1923. Members of the New Group were accepted into the Mánes Union of Fine Arts, but Hoffmeister stopped painting at that time and did not apply for admission. In the following period he devoted himself to caricatures, which he sent to Lidové noviny newspaper.

From autumn 1925 he became a core collaborator of the publishing house ''Aventinum'' and contributed cartoons, illustrations, articles about artists and interviews with important foreign authors to ''Rozpravy Aventina (Aventinum Talks)''.

1926–1930

After graduating in law, he travelled abroad regularly and worked as a correspondent for many magazines. In addition to information on cultural events, he also sent his own sketches of personalities he had met in person ( G.B. Shaw, G. K. Chesterton, London 1926). In 1926 he published a novel, ''The Tropic of Capricornus'', and a collection of poems, ''The Alphabet of Love''. As editor of the magazine Pestrý týden he became close to the magazine's editor-in-chief, Staša Jílovská.

In 1926–1930 he was married to the prose writer and art theoretician Maria Prušáková (1903–2004, later remarried Honzíková, wife of the architect Karel Honzík).

In 1927 he had his first solo exhibition in the gallery of the publishing house ''Odeon''. In April 1927, the poet Vladimir Mayakovsky stayed at his home during his visit to Prague. At Jiří Frejka's Dada Theatre, E.F. Burian presented a ''Voice-band'' programme with choral recitation of verses by several poets, including A. Hoffmeister. Together with Nezval, he accompanied the French poet Philippe Soupault and the publisher Léon Pierre-Quint around Prague. Miroslava Holzbachová performed Hoffmeister's ballet ''Park'' to music by Jaroslav Ježek at the Umělecká beseda. His merry play ''The Bride'', directed by Jindřich Honzl, premiered at the Osvobozené divadlo. The photographer of the performance was Jaroslav Rössler. Hoffmeister began a permanent collaboration with Voskovec, Werich and Ježek, for whom he prepared programmes and posters and drew numerous cartoons. The Mánes Union of Fine Arts organised a large exhibition of Hoffmeister's drawing portraits and accepted him as a full member, and the publishing house Aventinum, for which he prepared an advertising campaign for the opening of the Aventinum Mansard sales gallery, published a book of his feuilletons illustrated with drawings. He also illustrated books by G. K. Chesterton for the publishing house L. Kuncíř.

In 1928–1930 he worked as an editor at Lidové noviny and in 1930–1932 at Literární noviny. He illustrated his own satirical page, Pestrý týden / The Colourful Week, for the magazine ''Kmen'', which was directed by Julius Fučík. As a cover designer and illustrator, he collaborated with the publishing houses L. Kuncíř, V. Petr, A. Srdce, Odeon J. Fromka, Kvasnička and Hampl, Aventinum. He arranged with James Joyce the Czech edition of his Ulysses (V. Petr, 1930).

In 1928, he had his first solo exhibition in Paris (''Visages par Adolf Hoffmeister'') at the ''Galerie d'Art Contemporain'' and a reprise of this exhibition at the ''Galerie l'Epoque'' in Brussels. The success of this exhibition opened up the possibility of collaboration with the foreign press, especially with the newspaper L'Intransigeant. He became a member of the committee of the PEN Club in Prague.

From 1929 he was a member of the progressive organisation of Czech intellectuals, the Left Front. He exhibited 149 portraits in the Aventine Mansard (catalogue with introduction by Karel Teige, opening Jiří Voskovec and Jan Werich) and prepared a series of Czech likenesses for ''Rozpravy'', which was printed on the front page. He participated in an exhibition of caricatures in Louisville. He illustrated Gulliver's Travels, Eliška Junková's ''Auto-compass calendar'' and his own ''Calendar'' published by Aventinum (1930) and created covers for the Aventinum publishing house. He was one of the members of the Mánes Union of Fine Arts who left the association in protest against conservative trends (the so-called ''Secessionists of Mánes'') and took part in a joint exhibition of secessionists in 1930. He opened Josef Šíma's exhibition in the Aventinum Mansard.

In 1930, the publisher Otakar Štorch-Marien sent him on a tour of Europe to make interviews with important figures of European culture and illustrate them with his caricatures. Hoffmeister met with Tristan Tzara, James Joyce, Le Corbusier, André Gide, Paul Valéry and George Grosz. After returning to Prague, he passed the bar exam and became a partner in the law firm of Hoffmeister Sr., Tonder, Hoffmeister Jr.

1931–1939

In 1931, the artists of the so-called Secession from Mánes returned to the Mánes union when they were offered full artistic freedom. Hoffmeister temporarily returned to painting and exhibited two paintings at the 162nd Mánes Members' Exhibition in the autumn. In the summer he travelled with Bedřich Feuerstein to the Soviet Union and met Luncharsky, Tatlin, Tairov, Piscator, Meyer, and on the way back to Leningrad also G. B. Shaw and A. Huxley. He published his experiences in the book ''The Surface of the Five-Year Plan''. He proposed the set for the V. Dyk's play ''Forgetful'' at the National Theatre.

Hoffmeister's caricatured map of Europe was used on stage and in print in a new play ''Caesar'' by the Osvobozené divadlo (1932). Hoffmeister's critical comedy ''Singing Venice'' (published in book form by Melantrich, 1946) was staged at the Estates Theatre. Hoffmeister's reworking of Carlo Goldoni's play ''La bottega del café'' was successfully staged at the National Theatre and then in theatres throughout the country. He participated in an exhibition of surrealist art at the Mánes (''Poetry 1932''), and visited Egypt and Palestine.

In 1933 he exhibited 106 caricatures in České Budějovice (together with Antonín Pelc) and was elected to the committee of the Mánes union. Together with Nezval, he visited James Joyce in Paris and brought him his Czech translation of Anna Livia Plurabella. He was involved in replacing the editorial board and securing funding for the magazine ''Volné směry'' and as a lawyer in the drafting of the new statutes of Mánes union. He contributed to the play ''The World Behind Bars'' by the Osvobozené divadlo.

In 1934, he prepared an international exhibition of cartoons and humour at the Mánes, which he himself took part in. The exhibited anti-fascist works of John Heartfield, who lived in Prague as a German exile, aroused the displeasure of the German ambassador Walter Koch, who demanded their removal. The building was attacked by right-wing students, and at the time the Mánes union eventually succumbed to police pressure, 60,000 people saw the exhibition thanks to the diplomatic scandal. In August, as a member of the delegation to the ''First Congress of Soviet Writers'', Hoffmeister captured images of Gorkij, Pasternak, Babel, Bukharin, Bedny and Radek, which were then published by the magazines Ogoniok, ''Svět práce'', ''Doba'', exhibited at the Mánes Members' Exhibition and published as the album ''Images''. At the end of the year he visited Spain, where the civil war was about to break out.

In 1935 he exhibited cartoons with the Mánes union in Ostrava, Bratislava and Košice, and with A. Plec in Benešov. He became a member of the anti-fascist ''Club of Czech-German Theatre Workers'', where he became acquainted with a circle of Prague Germans and the composer Hans Krása, for whom he later wrote the libretto of the children's opera Brundibár (1938). In 1938, his comedy ''Youth in a Play'' with music by Hans Krása was staged by the Prague ''Kleine Bühne Theatre'', directed by E.F. Burian, and the same year it was performed in German translation (''Anna sagt nein''). In the March issue of Teige's journal ''Doba'' he published a critical article Socialist realism on the need for creative freedom, and he also criticised the conditions in the USSR in a series of articles in ''Volné směry'' (1935–1936). In Prague he accompanied André Breton and Paul Éluard. He created an updated map of Europe for the stage of the Osvobozené divadlo performance ''Reverse and Obverse'' (1936).

After the death of his father in 1936, he became head of the law firm ''Hoffmeister, Tonder, Pacák''. E.F. Burian´s ''Theatre D 36'' presented the ''Matinee of Caricatures'', a screening of caricatures by Hoffmeister, Bidlo, Pelc and Heartfield, accompanied by stage performances. In the fall, he traveled with arch. Jaroslav Fragner around the US and published the drawings and texts in the book ''American Swings''. He became a member of the ''Committee for the Relief of Democratic Spain''.

In 1937, he participated in the jubilee exhibition of the Mánes union on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of its foundation and lectured on art at an Mánes union event and at the ''Exhibition of the Czechoslovak Avant-Garde'' at the House of Art Industry in Prague (Národní 38). Together with A. Pelc, he exhibited caricatures at an exhibition at the House of Art in Ostrava. The fascists in the leadership of the gallery tried unsuccessfully to have the drawings of Hitler and Mussolini removed, and the scandal was widely reported in the press. He led the Mánes union tour to the USSR. Soviet censorship excluded the works of many artists, including Hoffmeister, from an exhibition of Czechoslovak art in Moscow. Further censorship crackdowns also affected the ''Today's Mánes'' exhibition in Prague, and Emil Filla suggested that Mánes union members create special works for the ''Artists Accuse'' exhibition.

Adolf Hoffmeister was awarded a Gold medal at the World Exhibition in Paris.Srp K, 2004, p. 343

In January 1938, with an article in ''Tvorba'' entitled "NO!", he defined himself against S.K. Neumann's earlier attack and defended the artist's right to freedom not subject to the dictates of socialist realism. He participated in the Mánes union member exhibition ''Black and White''. The writers' community delegated him to anti-fascist writers' meetings in Paris and London to defend Czechoslovak interests against W. Runciman's plans to annex the Sudetenland to the Third Reich. Throughout the year he was involved in anti-fascist activities – in Paris he had an exhibition of anti-fascist cartoons at the ''Maison de la Culture'', which was introduced by Louis Aragon, and he proposed a fund-raising campaign among the members of the Mánes union. He participated in the PEN Club congress in Prague and in the activities of the ''Association of Czechoslovak Writers''.

In early 1939, his cartoons were exhibited in the Topič Salon at the posthumous exhibition of Karel Čapek and at an exhibition of likenesses of Mánes union members.

File:24. Adolf Hoffmeister, Řím nese černou kulturu Habešanům, 1936.jpg, Adolf Hoffmeister, Rome brings black culture to the Abyssinians, 1936
File:18. Adolf Hoffmeister, Španělskou zemi mám tak rád, 1936.jpg, Adolf Hoffmeister, I love the Spanish country so much, 1936 ( Voskovec and Werich)
File:22. Adolf Hoffmeister, Karel Čapek, 1938.jpg, Adolf Hoffmeister, Karel Čapek, 1938
File:20. Adolf Hoffmeister, Novoročenka pro Voskovce, Wericha a Ježka na rok 1939, 1938.jpg, New Year's card for Voskovec, Werich and Ježek for 1939, (1938)

Emigration

Two days after the occupation of Czechoslovakia by German troops and the declaration of the Protectorate, he received an invitation to France on 18 March 1939, arranged by Aragon. He was granted an extraordinary French visa and fled to Paris on 23 April. There he made contacts with resistance organisations and, with the help of French communists, founded the ''Maison de la Culture Tchécoslovaque''. In September 1939, after the occupation of eastern Poland by Soviet troops, he was arrested on the basis of an anonymous denunciation and accused, along with many other Czechoslovak citizens (Pelc, Diviš, Reinerová, Kopf, etc.), as an agent of Moscow. He was imprisoned for seven months in solitary confinement in La Santé Prison. There he wrote a puppet play, ''The Tramp or King Famine'', for his nieces and nephews, which was brought out of prison by his lawyer.

In 1940, a military tribunal acquitted him of anti-French activities, but he continued to be interned in the concentration camps of Roland Garros (Paris), Damigny (Normandy) and Bassens (Bordeaux). On the day of the French surrender, he escaped to Casablanca but was again interned. On the guarantee of his compatriots living in Morocco, he was released and went by boat to Tangier, where he was again interned for a week and finally reached Lisbon with a cargo ship.

In January 1941, with the help of Jan Werich and Jiří Voskovec, he sailed to New York City via Havana

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