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, an injury that caused complications 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 later became 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
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 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 of payment transactions for 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, transferring them 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. == Ancestry ==