Heinz Hemrich (1923 – 8 December 2009) was a German sculptor. Born in

Schwäbisch Hall Schwäbisch Hall (; 'Swabian Hall'; from 1802 until 1934 and colloquially: ''Hall'') is a city in the German state of Baden-Württemberg located in the valley of the Kocher river, the longest tributary (together with its headwater Lein) of the N ...

, Hemrich performed military service (including a period in captivity) from 1942 to 1945. He studied from 1946 to 1951 at the ''Kunstschule

Mainz Mainz (; #Names and etymology, see below) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate, and with around 223,000 inhabitants, it is List of cities in Germany by population, Germany's 35th-largest city. It lies in ...

'' (Art School Mainz), the ''Kunstakademie Stuttgart'' (Stuttgart Art Academy) and the ''Darmstädter

Werkkunstschule A Kunstgewerbeschule (English: ''School of Arts and Crafts'' or S''chool of Applied Arts'') was a type of vocational arts school that existed in German-speaking countries from the mid-19th century. The term Werkkunstschule was also used for the ...

'' (Arts and Crafts School in Darmstadt). From 1951 to 1953 he was assistant at the Technische Hochschule Darmstadt (Technical University of Darmstadt) and a freelance sculptor from 1953. In 1963 he took a teaching position at the ''Kunsthochschule Mainz'' (State University of Arts and Crafts Mainz). From 1973 he worked at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, first as a lecturer and later as a professor. Among his students was

Karlheinz Oswald Karlheinz Oswald (born 1958) is a German sculptor known for his portraits and cast iron sculptures, many of dancers, often displayed in public places. He studied at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz from 1981, and between 1983 and 1988 ...

. Hemrich was from 1957 a member of the

Darmstädter Sezession The Darmstädter Sezession (Darmstadt Secession) is an association of visual artists based in Darmstadt, Germany. It was founded in 1919. When it was revived in 1945, it was sometimes also called Neue Darmstädter Sezession (New Darmstadt Secession ...

and participated in several of its exhibitions. Hemrich executed numerous commissions for public buildings such as universities, churches and schools. His focus was

Percent for Art The term percent for art refers to a program, often a city ordinance, where a fee, usually some percentage of the project cost, is placed on large scale development projects in order to fund and install public art. The details of such programs va ...

and small sculptural works. In 1963/64 he created new concrete buttresses with symbolic representations of civic history for

St. Christoph, Mainz The church of St. Christoph in Mainz, known in German as St. Christoph zu Mainz, is an example of early gothic architecture. St. Christoph was originally built between 1240 and 1330. The church is associated with Johannes Gutenberg, who may have ...

, where

Johannes Gutenberg Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg ( – 3 February 1468) was a German inventor and Artisan, craftsman who invented the movable type, movable-type printing press. Though movable type was already in use in East Asia, Gutenberg's inven ...

was baptised and which was damaged in World War II. For the Protestant ''Auferstehungskirche'' (Resurrection Church) in Mainz, he took the late medieval motif of a pictured Bible and redesigned it as a concrete frieze.

Literature

* Fritz Richard Barran: ''Kunst am Bau heute: Wandbild, Relief und Plastik in der Baukunst der Gegenwart'', J. Hoffmann, 1964, p. 162

External links

*
Heinz Hemrich verstorben

Allgemeine Zeitung The ''Allgemeine Zeitung'' was the leading political daily journal in Germany in the first part of the 19th century. It has been widely recognised as the first world-class German journal and a symbol of the German press abroad. The ''Allgemein ...

, Mainz, 12 December 2009 {{DEFAULTSORT:Hemrich, Heinz 1923 births 2009 deaths People from Schwäbisch Hall 20th-century German sculptors 20th-century German male artists German male sculptors