Eduard von der Heydt

Eduard Freiherr von der Heydt (September 26, 1882 – April 3, 1964) was a German and Swiss banker, art collector and patron.

Biography
He was born in Elberfeld, Germany and died in Ascona Switzerland. Heydt served in the Imperial German Army during World War I. He was badly wounded from a gunshot wound to the stomach, and injury which he suffered complications from for the rest of his life. In 1919 he married Vera von Schwabach (1899–1996), daughter of the Berlin banker,. The marriage ended in divorce in 1927; there were no children. Vera was later a prominent Jungian analyst in London.

Heydt's collections were the basis for the creation of the Museum Rietberg in Zürich, Switzerland. He was also the former owner of the Monte Verità, a well known site of many different Utopian and cultural events and communities, which upon his death became the property of the Swiss Canton of Ticino. He was also a member of the NSDAP until he became a Swiss citizen in 1937 and left the party in 1939. After the Second World War, he was arrested for treason for his handling payment transactions of the German intelligence service under Wilhelm Canaris. Heydt was acquitted in 1948. Unconvinced of his innocence, the U.S. government confiscated all of Heydt's American bank deposits as well as his works of art to the Buffalo Museum of Science as "enemy assets" under the Trading with the Enemy Act.

Heydt described art using the term "ars una", an all encompassing art that appreciates diversity as it is found throughout the world.

Works

 * Eduard von der Heydt/Werner von Rheinbaben: Auf dem Monte Verità. Erinnerungen und Gedanken über Menschen, Kunst und Politik, Atlantis, Zürich 1958.