World War I and World War II
The outbreak of World War I in 1914 not only ruptured the Cubist experiments in art but resulted in Kahnweiler, of German origin, being considered by the French as an alien; and being forced to live in exile in Switzerland. Many German nationals living in France had their possessions sequestered by the French state, and as a result, Kahnweiler's collection was confiscated in 1914 and sold by the government in a series of auctions at the Hôtel Drouot between 1921 and 1923.
During the years of exile (until 1920) he studied and wrote on his experiences. He wrote works such as the Der Weg Zum Kubismus and Confessions esthétiques. Writing becoming a passion he continued over his lifetime, creating hundreds of books and major articles. The second period of enforced writing was the internal exile which occurred during World War II where as a Jew, the Nazis forced him to flee Paris. He remained in France in hiding; where as he put it under the clouds of the gas chambers he wrote the seminal work on Juan Gris.
Read more about this topic: Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler
Famous quotes containing the words world and/or war:
“That popular fable of the sot who was picked up dead-drunk in the street, carried to the duke’s house, washed and dressed and laid in the duke’s bed, and, on his waking, treated with all obsequious ceremony like the duke, and assured that he had been insane, owes its popularity to the fact that it symbolizes so well the state of man, who is in the world a sort of sot, but now and then wakes up, exercises his reason and finds himself a true prince.”
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“The words of his mouth were smoother than butter, but war was in his heart: his words were softer than oil, yet were they drawn swords.
Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and he shall sustain thee: he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved.”
—Bible: Hebrew Psalm LV (l. LV, 21–22)