Influenced by Cubism, in 1918 Kurt Schwitters began making collages in a style he called “Merzbilder” (or “Merzpictures”). The term “Merz” comes from the German phrase “Kommerz und Privatbank,” which the artist found on a scrap of newsprint. Collages like Difficult were born out of poverty in post–World War I (1914–18) Germany; Schwitters literally created his art out of the physical ruins of the culture. “I felt myself freed [from the war] and had to shout my jubilation out to the world,” he recalled. “Out of Parsimony [frugality] I took whatever I found to do this, because we’re now a poor country.”

Label from Picasso: The Artist and His Models, November 5, 2016–February 19, 2017