Alfred Flechtheim: Portrait of a Vanished Europe

The luminosity of Flechtheim’s environs and its creative output contrasts with the paltry state of affairs of today, aptly described by Colombian writer Santiago Gamboa, after living (and recently leaving) there nearly two decades: “[The continent is] a museum missing some blood in its veins, because it is ossified.”6 Weimar’s achievements are a testament to the prowess of Europe’s creative lifeforce despite the carnage of the Great War; however. However, there was no reservoir of creative strength, no human or superhuman power capable of overcoming the carnage and the material and environmental devastation of both World War I and World War II, back-to-back hecatombs. As such, Alfred Flechtheim, to me, represents the legacy of the European cultural fin de siècle, its ability to re- blossom into familiar and newer forms in the interwar years despite the catastrophe of World War I and the looming political and economic threats of the interwar years. Given Flechtheim’s accomplishments in interwar European culture, I was surprised at the paucity of information about his life–minus a couple of proverbial (and terrific) articles available about him and a flurry of passing anecdotes scattered across publications.7

Over the past two years, I’ve witnessed the growth and interest on Flechtheim develop both online and in print, a trend that bodes well for the further exploration, recovery, and re-insertion of Alfred Flechtheim’s life and contributions into broader European cultural memory, conversation, and scholarship. Both the void in information and the resurgence of interest in Flechhteim clearly reflect the changing conversation and polemic around the restitution of Nazi–era stolen art. With billions of dollars at stake in terms of art restitution, many preeminent organizations and art institutions would prefer that the history of Alfred Flechtheim and many others altogether fade or be relegated to a curious footnote. Thus, even in writing a research essay for my personal blog, I am made keenly aware of the intrinsic relationship, as in a DNA helix, between politics, historical recovery, and collective memory.