tion of their Moscow-endorsed confrontation course with the SPD.Inreality,the
proletarian dream was alreadybeing appropriated, if not hijacked, byavery dif-
ferent kind of socialistrevolution. Five years later,the KPDwas alreadybanned
and Heartfield forced into exile in Prague and,later,London. His postwarrepu-
tation as the inventor of political photomontage would not come from his exten-
sive work for the KPD,but from the antifascist photomontagesthat appeared on
the covers ofArbeiter-Illustrierte-Zeitung(AIZ,Workers Pictorial Newspaper)dur-
ing the early1930s and in exile publications such asVolk-Illustrierte (VI)
throughoutWorld WarII.⁵
Adeceptively simple design,Five Fingersdepictsaman’sopen hand against
aneutral whitebackground, with the fingers slightlycurled and the lines of the
palm clearlyvisible. The hand’ssize and shape,together with the dark cuff of the
boilersuit,suggest an industrial worker,with the shaded areas on the left evok-
ing the dirt and grime of manuallabor.Aswas his practice, Heartfield retouched
the original photograph, in this caseinorder to intensify thegesture of grasping
and seizing.The intended messageisone of confidence and determination, but
in light of the interrelatedness ofrage and fear,the raised hand might also sug-
gest aman (andaparty) pleading for help. In fact,the oddlylong index finger is
reminiscent of Christian hand signs and an established iconographyofsacrifice
that the communist ethos of party discipline repeatedlyreferenced. The artists’
signatureinthe upper left and the number five are drawninbrightred. This cen-
trallyplaced“ 5 ”appears as part of two slogans,“With 5You Seize the Enemy”
and“Vote List5Communist Party.”The slippage, in the mode of address,from
the second person singular (“YouSeize”)tothe plural imperative (“Vote”), pre-
figures the necessary movefrom individual to collective agency that presumably
will produceasuccessful election outcome–if need be, through violent action.
Lest there be anydoubts about the impliedrelationship between hand and fist,it
was Ernst Thälmann,the leader of the KPD, who personallyapproved the poster
and, in another context,allegedlysaid:“Youcan break one finger,but five fin-
gers makeafist.”⁶
Forahistorical perspective on the 1928 electoral campaign, see EricD. Weitz,Creating German
Communism, 1890–1990: FromPopular Protests to Socialist State(Princeton:Princeton Univer-
sity Press, 1997), 62 – 99.
Original:“Einen Fingerkann man brechen, aber fünf Fingersind eineFaust.”The often-quot-
ed sentence appears inKurt Maetzig’stwo- part biopicErnstThälmann, Sohnseiner Klasse(1954).
On Thälmann‘sreaction to the poster,see the memo by Gertrud Heartfield reprinted in März,
John Heartfield,51.
John Heartfield’sProductive Rage 305