Color, offset lithographic poster printed on off-white paper and adhered to a white linen backing. It features a stern-looking man shown from the chest up, dressed in a black suit and tie adorned with a yellow swastika, a thin mustache, and a pencil in his ear. The top of his head is open, and inside is a caricatured Jewish man wearing a black suit and a tie decorated with a Star of David. The Jewish man’s hand motions toward a black banner with yellow German text. To the man’s right is a canted, yellow rectangle with two white swastikas and two lines of small black text. To the left is a vertical yellow banner with 3 lines of black text. The bottom has a thick, black banner with large white-and-yellow text.
Fight against the Jews and their fraudulent ways Antisemitic poster by Fips urging Germans to fight Jewish overpricing
Phillipp Rupprecht (1900-1975) was born in Nuremberg, Germany. He served in the German Navy during World War I. In 1920, he left Germany for Argentina, where he worked as a waiter and cowboy for several years. In the mid-1920s, he returned to Germany and worked as a cartoonist for the Fränkischen Tagespost, a Socialist newspaper. After drawing a cartoon of the Lord Mayor of Nuremberg, Hermann Luppe, Rupprecht was hired as an illustrator for the antisemitic newspaper Der Stürmer, by Julius Streicher, publisher of the paper and a regional leader of the Nazi party. While there, Rupprecht worked under the pen name Fips and became known for his variations on the antisemitic stereotype of the bearded, bulging eyed, large-nosed Jew. In 1938, he illustrated the antisemitic children's book, Der Giftpilz (The Poison Mushroom), published by the Stürmer publishing house. He joined the German Navy in 1939, but was released to create propaganda for the Nazi party. Rupprecht stayed at the paper until the last issue was published on February 22, 1945, and his career ended with the defeat of Germany in May. After the war, Rupprecht was captured by the United States Army and held in the 7th Army Internee Camp #74 in Ludwigsburg, Germany. He was put on trial as part of the de-Nazification process and sentenced to six years hard labor. Rupprecht was released from Eichstätt prison on October 23, 1950. He married twice, had four children, and worked in Munich as a painter and decorator until his death.
German antisemitic propaganda poster encouraging Germans to fight against unfair Jewish business practices, designed by Philipp Rupprecht (Fips). The poster features a German businessman with a Jewish money lender (that he likely owes money to) on his mind. The Nazis used propaganda to push the narrative that Jewish greed was a burden to society. The image uses the antisemitic trope of the Jewish usurer; a moneylender who charges excessive interest, which originated in the Middle Ages. In many areas of medieval Europe, Jews were barred from many occupations and from owning land. In turn, they had to rely on interest from moneylending to earn income. During this time, the Catholic Church regarded moneylending for interest as immoral, and prohibited Catholics from the practice. Because of this stigma, Jewish moneylenders were seen as immoral and predatory by their Catholic counterparts. These ideas evolved into the antisemitic concept of the fraudulent, parasitic, Jewish businessman who worshipped money. Nazi propaganda used this trope to promote the narrative that Jews were bad for German (Aryan) business and created an atmosphere that tolerated violence against Jews. The Nazis communicated their propaganda through art, music, film, radio, books, posters, and other published materials. Philipp Rupprecht, who used the penname Fips, was one of the Nazi’s preeminent propaganda creators. Rupprecht was an artist for Julius Streicher’s Der Stürmer, an antisemitic newspaper that prominently displayed Rupprecht’s work. His illustrations portrayed Jews as heartless and cruel, and featured discriminatory images of Jews with exaggerated facial features, and misshapen bodies. Rupprecht also illustrated the antisemitic children’s book Der Giftpilz (The Poisonous Mushroom).
The poster was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1993 by Alex Kertesz.
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overall: Height: 51.125 inches (129.858 cm) | Width: 38.875 inches (98.743 cm)
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