Carl Einstein

Carl Einstein (26 April 1885 – 5 July 1940), born Karl Einstein, was an influential German Jewish writer, art historian, anarchist and critic.

Regarded as one of the first critics to appreciate the development of Cubism, as well as for his work on African art and influence on the European avant-garde, Einstein was a friend and colleague of such figures as George Grosz, Georges Braque, Pablo Picasso and Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler. His work combined many strands of both political and aesthetic discourse into his writings, addressing both the developing aesthetic of modern art and the political situation in Europe.

Einstein's involvement in social and political life was characterized by communist sympathies and anarchist views. A target of the German right wing during the interwar Weimar period, Einstein left Germany for France in 1928, a half-decade ahead of the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party, later taking part in the Spanish Civil War on the side of the anti-Francisco Franco anarcho-syndicalists during the 1930s.

Trapped in southern France following Nazi Germany's defeat of the French Third Republic, Einstein took his own life by jumping from a bridge on 5 July 1940.

Carl Einstein who was born to a German Jewish family on 26 April 1885, in the Rhineland town of Neuwied. The second child born to Daniel Einstein, an active member of the local Jewish community, and Sophie Einstein, Carl was a year younger than his sister Hedwig, who would become known as a concert pianist and the wife of sculptor Benno Elkan. A third child born to Daniel and Sophie died in 1889. The young Carl Einstein spent much of his youth in Karlsruhe before moving to Berlin to study philosophy and art history in 1903. Originally given the standard German spelling of his first name as "Karl" at birth, he adopted the Latinized spelling "Carl" in the 1900s. In Berlin he attended the lectures of Georg Simmel and Heinrich Wölfflin but lacking a high school diploma (Abitur) he could not gain a doctorate. In 1907 he visited Paris and learnt of Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque and Juan Gris, as well as other artists. Upon his return he started writing prose and joined the radical circle around Franz Pfemfert and his magazine Die Aktion. This led to the publication of Bebuquin oder die Dilettanten des Wunders in serialised form in Die Aktion in 1912, with an subsequent volume collecting the episodes in a single book. In 1913 he married Maria Ramm, sister of Alexandra Ramm-Pfemfert and so becoming Franz's brother in law.

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