Die Kunst, das Schwere leicht zu machen. Martin Grotjahns Biografie, gespiegelt in seinen unwiderstehlichen Cartoons1

The art of making seriousness easy. The biography of Martin Grotjahn reflected in his compelling cartoons

Martin Grotjahn, son of a famous family of physicians, (*8.7.1094 in Berlin–†30.9.1990 in L.A.) was a psychiatrist before he began his training at the psychoanalytic institute of Berlin. He shared the fate of his half-jewish wife Etelka. They emigrated to the USA with career stages in the Menninger-Clinic in Topeka, the Franz Alexander Institute in Chicago and different military facilities, finally finding a new home in L. A. Martin became one of the shrinks of Hollywood. Unsolved conflicts remaining from his training analysis with Ernst Simmel accompanied by war experience and generation conflicts lead to heavy human disappointment and the split of the psychoanalytic society in L. A. In his cartoons Grotjahn creates his own funny and cathartic imagination room as a transfer between his violated inner life and a challenging external world. Grotjahn reflects, analyses, comforts himself with humour, fun, and self-irony, and constantly recreates his love for Etelka using his cartoons. Interpretations of the characters of Ferdinand the Bull and Alice in Wonderland reveal Grotjahn strolling around between conscious and uncounscious.