The Free German League of Culture (Freier Deutscher Kulturbund), founded by emigrants, many of them politically persecuted, was an association of artists and authors who organised exhibitions, concerts, readings and plays. The League was founded in 1938 at the home of the artist Fred Uhlman, but moved to its own headquarters in Hampstead, London, at the turn of 1939/40. The Free German League of Culture was committed to the preservation and communication of a free German culture that had not been appropriated by National Socialism. It also aimed to contribute to understanding between the English population and refugees and to stand in solidarity with other democratic, liberal and progressive movements (Coles 2014, 318).
A self-description of the League states its aim as being: “in the cultural field, to preserve the most beautiful things that Germany has given to the world – to convey the most beautiful things that England has given to the world and to the German refugees – and to give the German refugees the opportunity to submit their work in the cultural field to the judgement of the public. In the field of welfare to help the German refugees with social, legal and medical advice, to support the internees, and to pave the way for the refugees to be integrated into the labour process”. (Flesch 1941, translated from German) The Free German League of Culture empowered its members by allowing them to organise and participate artistically.

The events were mainly directed at the émigré community, but local audiences were also addressed and English creatives and intellectuals such as the Bishop of Chichester or the biologist Julian Huxley engaged as patrons and honorary members of the League. It was not only an organisation that strengthened self-confidence and visibility, but also a charity that raised money for internees (for example through concerts and sales exhibitions) and drew attention to the plight of internees (Bihler 2018, 124). The events of the Free German League of Culture were announced and discussed in the Freie Deutsche Kultur newsletter. This was published between 1939 and 1945, from 1941 with the writer Max Zimmering as editor. Contributors included Lion Feuchwanger, Oskar Kokoschka, Anna Seghers and many more. Through the Freie Deutsche Kultur newsletter, members and other interested parties were informed about the League’s cultural activities – concerts, exhibitions, plays, readings and lectures.
In addition, advertisements were placed in Freie Deutsche Kultur, which functioned in two directions: emigrants were able to offer their services and in turn were offered services and goods ranging from language courses to accommodation, photocopying facilities, food, furniture and textiles. In Freie Deutsche Kultur, no. 4, 1940, p. 2, for example, there appeared an advertisement for “Practical English for Foreigners”. The League was thus not only a forum that offered exchange and opportunities to present artistic work, but also an information exchange that supported everyday life and functioned as a node in a network that extended far beyond art and culture. In addition, it also addressed the basic needs of the emigrants, providing cheap hot lunches at the clubhouse in Hampstead. These were advertised thus: “Cheap lunch daily from 12.30 to 2 o’clock at the FDKB house, 36a, Upper Park Road” with the addition “cheaper by subscription” (Freie Deutsche Kultur, no. 3, 1940, p. 4).
But by no means all emigrated artists joined the League, and some may have been discouraged by the organisation’s leftist political agenda. In a letter to the League on 1 September 1945, the artist Kurt Schwitters wrote: “The responsibility of an artist is only to art. If someone who makes pictures or sculptures were under any other influence than that of the laws of art for the form of his work, then this work would not be art and the person concerned would not be an artist.” (Schwitters 1974, 182, translated from German)

The Artists’ Section of the Free German League of Culture organised several exhibitions, often in cooperation with other organisations such as the Artists’ International Association. Shortly after the opening of the new clubhouse in Hampstead, Freie Deutsche Kultur called on artists to exhibit at the Kulturbundhaus; the newsletter had a circulation of 2,000 copies and the aim was to draw the attention of a wider public to the shows (Freie Deutsche Kultur, no. 5, 1940, p. 5).
In addition to this supportive function, the League’s exhibitions had other concerns: for example, shows such as Exhibition of English and Refugee Art were intended to raise funds to support emigrants interned since 1940 in camps such as those on the Isle of Man and in Canada. Exhibitions of works by (former) internees, such as Camp Art in Canada. Exhibition of Interned Refugee’s Art and Poetry (1941), were intended to draw attention to internees overseas. John Heartfield, who gave the introductory speech for the exhibition, published a review of the exhibition in Freie Deutsche Kultur, which said: “‘Don’t forget us!’ our friends who are still interned call out to us. This exhibition supports in the best possible way the tireless work of the Free German Cultural Association: not to forget them and to give them all the help we can until they are all free again and can work together with us to make the sun rise.” (Heartfield 1941, 2, translated from German). The Allies Inside Germany exhibition, organised in 1942, aimed to inform and educate, but at the same time advocated for the émigré community as representatives of another Germany. The exhibition opened on 3 July 1942 in an empty shop at 149 Regent Street and later toured English cities. Organised in 1943, Artists Aid Jewry was dedicated to the Jewish victims of Nazism and brought together 137 works by 39 artists in exile (Müller-Härlin 2010, 68).

The 1941 An Exhibition of Paintings and Engravings: The Story of London Town (Freie Deutsche Kultur, July 1941, p. 3) showed how emigrant and other artists dealt with the city of London in wartime. In this way, the League showed an artistic form of place-making. At the end of 1941, the Exhibition of Sculpture, Pottery and Sculptors’ Drawings was organised by the League, together with the Artists’ International Association, in the League’s clubhouse in Upper Park Road in London. In December 1941, the League’s newsletter Freie Deutsche Kultur looked back on the successful exhibition, which was “praised by English critics as well as the emigration press”. The text particularly highlights a bust by Jussuf Abbo as “splendid work[ing]” and refers to the acclaim for and sales of Abbo’s pottery on display (Anonymous 1941). Also worthy of mention is the group exhibition Exhibition of Drawings, Paintings and Sculptures (1944), which with 50 works gave an impression of the diversity of artistic expression in the German-speaking emigrant community. Monographic exhibitions were also organised by the FDKB: for example, an exhibition of the artists René Graetz, Dorothea Wüsten, Igna Beth and Erich Kahn was announced for April 1944, demonstrating the League’s open-mindedness towards female artists, who were shown here in a ratio of 1:1 alongside their male colleagues (Freie Deutsche Kultur, no. 4, 1944, p. 12). Freie Deutsche Kultur appeared until 1945, partly as a series of publications of the Free German League of Culture, which disbanded a year later.