Alfred Flechtheim, the German collector, art dealer, and publisher, was a shadowy but significant figure in Ernest Hemingway’s life. Hemingway knew him at the peak of his prestige, influence, and fame, but lost contact when Flechtheim was overwhelmed by tragedy.
Flechtheim was born in Münster in northwest Germany in 1878, the scion of a wealthy Jewish family who—like the Buddenbrooks in Thomas Mann’s novel—had been grain merchants for several generations. He began work in his father’s business, but was soon drawn to modern paintings. “There is something crazy about art,” he declared. “It’s a passion stronger than gambling, alcohol, and women.”
Flechtheim exhibited works by Impressionist and Post-Impressionist artists before they became fashionable and expensive.
In 1910 Flechtheim married the Jewish heiress Betty Goldschmidt, and during their honeymoon in Paris he spent a large part of her substantial dowry on Cubist art. They had no children, but their elegant home was lined with bookcases and filled with contemporary paintings and Oceanic sculpture. In 1913 he opened his first gallery in Düsseldorf on the Rhine—followed after the war by others in Berlin, Frankfurt, Cologne, and Vienna. He invited many celebrities from the world of theater and film to his famous costume parties in the main gallery. His friend, the German heavyweight champion Max Schmeling, loyally affirmed, “If I were a painter, I would want Flechtheim to represent me.”
In the Düsseldorf catalogue of 1987, Alfred Flechtheim: Sammler. Kunsthändler. Verleger, Wilmont Haacke
