File of material relating to Kurt Schwitters

File of materials relating to Kurt Schwitters including photographs of Schwitters and his family; letters addressed to Edith Thomas relating to Schwitters and his work; private view cards for exhibitions on Schwitters; exhibition catalogues; postcards; Kurt Schwitters' death certificate; and a story by Kurt Schwitters entitled: 'The Landlady'.

Kurt Schwitters was born in Hanover on 20 June 1887. From 1908-14, he studied at the School of Arts and Crafts, Hanover, the Academy of Dresden and the Academy in Berlin. In 1915, he settled in Hanover and married Helma Fischer. Two years later, Schwitters entered military service and began to turn away from figurative painting towards an expressionistic cubist style. He exhibited for the first time in 1918 at 'Der Sturm' gallery, Berlin; the same year that his son, Ernst was born. In 1919 Schwitters exhibited the first MERZ pictures and began to show regularly at 'Der Sturm' (alongside Klee and Molzahn). It was during this period that many of his most famous poems, prose writings, polemic articles and ideas were published. In 1920, Schwitters met Hans Arp and Raoul Hausmann and his work was shown in New York for the first time. From 1920 to 1936, Schwitters devoted much of his time on the construction of the 'MERZbau' in his house in the Waldhausenstrasse, Hanover. Schwitters also exhibited widely (meeting Theo van Doesburg and other members of the De Stijl movement). He published 24 issues of the MERZ-magazine during this period. From 1929, Schwitters began to visit Norway regularly for a few months each year. In 1932 he joined the 'Abstraction-Création' group in Paris and a number of his works were exhibited at Museum of Modern Art, New York in 1936. After 13 of his works were confiscated from German museums in 1937 and 4 were shown in the `Entartete Kunst' exhibition, Schwitters left Germany for Norway. He never returned. In Norway, he began work on the second MERZbau, which was destroyed by fire in 1951. When the Germans invaded Norway in 1940, Schwitters escaped with his son to England, where he was interned for the first 17 months. After his release he went to live with his son in Bayswater, London. Here he met Edith Thomas, who he nicknamed 'Wantee' (a reference to her usual query when about to make tea). Later that year, the Schwitters moved to Barnes, where Thomas would spend most weekends cooking and caring for Kurt and Ernst Schwitters. In 1943, the MERZbau in Hanover was destroyed by an air raid and in the following year Schwitters' first solo exhibition in England (and outside Germany) was held at the Modern Art Gallery, London in 1944; Herbert Read wrote the introduction to the catalogue. In 1945, Ernst Schwitters returned to Norway and Kurt and Wantee moved to Westmoreland in the Lake District. In 1947, upon receipt of a Fellowship Award from MOMA, New York, Schwitters began to work (although seriously ill) at Cylinders farm in Little Langdale on the third MERZbau, which was never finished (one wall now resides in the Hatton Gallery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne). From 1944 to 1946 Schwitters suffered a series of strokes and seriously fractured his leg in 1947. He died of heart failure on 8 January 1948 and was buried in Ambleside. In 1970, Ernst Schwitters had his father's body exhumed and re-buried in Hanover. Edith Thomas, who helped to keep Schwitters name alive, died in March 1991.

Numbered sequentially based on the order in which it was originally catalogued in the card cataloguing system.

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Material donated by Geoff Thomas in 1995 (TGA 9510), Miscellaneous material donated by Klaus Hinrichsen (TGA 959) Audio-visual material under TAV 3AB; and TAV 1499-1500D. Additional photographs and press cuttings can be found under the relevant collections - please ask a member of staff for assistance.