Nied, Heinz

Psychological counselor, mediator, gallery owner, reciter, journalist

Born: 24.07.1936 in Wiesbaden

Died: 06.08.2010 in Mainz

The twelve-year-old had a key experience in bombed-out Darmstadt, where the family had moved from Wiesbaden, when he heard Wolfgang Borchert's radio play "Outside the Door" on the radio for the first time. Nevertheless, in accordance with his parents' wishes, he initially trained as an industrial clerk. From 1961, he took lessons at the Herta Genzmer drama school, which recommended that he work as a reciter. In November 1962, Nied read from texts by Wolfang Borchert for the first time. As an interpreter of this author's texts as well as those by Kurt Tucholsky, Erich Kästner, Francois Villon, Rainer Maria Rilke, Hermann Hesse and African poetry, he attracted a great deal of attention from then on.

From 1971, he supported the Czech artists' group "Velvets" to enable them to get started in Wiesbaden. The following year, he founded the "Tusculum Gallery" in Wiesbaden, where he and his wife Barbara presented more than 100 artists in 60 exhibitions and which became a meeting place for many. In 1978, he founded the "Tusculum Prize for Visual Artists", which was awarded ten times until 1987 and was endowed with DM 1,000 each time. The city of Wiesbaden awarded him the bronze and silver citizens' medal for his wide-ranging commitment.

After reunification in 1990, Nied recited texts by Borchert and Tucholsky in Wiesbaden's twin city Görlitz and other East German cities, including Leipzig's Nicolai Church and Dresden's Frauenkirche. His pilot project "Readings in Schools" began in the same year. In 2002, the "Tusculum Zimmertheater für Rezitation" was founded in Putbus on the island of Rügen. For ten years, the private art collection of Barbara and Heinz Nied was exhibited in the orangery there, comprising watercolors, woodcuts, drawings, portfolios and letter drawings by Wolf Hildebrandt, a former Bauhaus student, created since the 1970s.

Nied was known as a tireless promoter and supporter of artists of all disciplines, be it fine arts, literature or theater.