Bernhard Heiliger is one of the most outstanding contemporary German sculptors. Along with Hans Uhlmann and Karl Hartung he contributed to the rebirth of international meaning of German sculpture after the war. 

His individual works decorate the representative squares and buildings of numerous cities. They are exhibited by the largest museums and the most prestigious galleries in the world. He spent only his childhood and youth in Szczecin, in 1938 he left to study in Berlin and - despite numerous trips - remained faithful to it until the end of his life. However, he mentioned that he owed his interest in sculpture, the basis of education and the shaping of his artistic vision to Szczecin and the School of Artistic Crafts located here he graduated from.

There are only scarce silent and generally unknown traces of Bernhard Heiliger left in our city. First of all, the house where he was born was preserved. His father, Hermann, who traded in textiles, and his mother, Anna, together with their three daughters, came to Szczecin in 1912 from Berlin and settled in an elegant district next to the Haken Terrace (now Wały Chrobrego), a spacious apartment on the ground floor of a stately tenement house at today's 11 Swarożyca Street. Here, on November 11, 1915, their only son was born, baptized in the church of St. Peter and Paul named Bernhard Ernst Johannes. His childhood was burdened by the war and the deep crisis lasting for many years after its end. Financial problems forced the family to move to a more modest apartment in a now non-existent house at 3 Lubomirskiego Street, and then to another one - at 57 Piotra Ściegiennego Street.

Young Bernhard's artistic abilities were probably discovered by a drawing teacher from the Barnim school at today's Unisławy Street. It seems that at his encouragement he decided to learn the profession of a stonemason at the local craft school, which enabled particularly gifted students to continue their education at the School of Artistic Crafts. From 1930, it was located in an impressive complex of buildings at Kilińskiego Square. The modernist shape of the building, at that time one of the most modern in Germany, corresponded to the profile of classes conducted here in the field of drawing, painting, sculpture, ceramics, interior design, applied and advertising graphics, textiles and fashion.

Bernhard Heiliger's main teacher was sculptor Kurt Schwerdtfeger, a graduate of Bauhaus, a leading centre of modern German art. On account of this, as well as thanks to the lectures conducted by the then director of the city museum, Dr. Walter Rezler and the art exhibitions organized by this museum, Heiliger gained the basics of education, which, after further studies in Paris and Berlin, resulted in works described as groundbreaking for post-war German sculpture. Heliger went to study in Berlin thanks to a scholarship he received in Szczecin. Therefore he tried not to break off his contacts with his hometown, especially since in 1937 the local museum bought his half-metre-tall artificial stone sculpture entitled Binding Sheaves. It was exhibited in 1938, then it was lost.

Other works presented at local exhibitions in subsequent years have not survived either: female bronze figures and portraits in stone. The latter turned out to be the most fascinating subject of Heiliger's sculptures since the 1950s, bringing him worldwide fame, as was the design of an unknown political prisoner's monument kept in Tate Britain, his participation in documenta art presentations in Kassel three times, monuments located in a variety of cities, including the Flame in Berlin or sculptures that complement the architecture of public buildings (embassy in Paris, philharmonic in Berlin). His creative achievements have brought him many honours, prestigious titles and awards.

Today, among the artist's legacy, stored mainly in Berlin, only two drawings remind us of the years in Szczecin - Pomeranian Homestead from 1931 and Fishing Boats from 1937, all the others date from the post-war period and do not refer to Szczecin. However, biographies published in numerous lexicons of artists and albums of contemporary art evoke the place of origin of the sculptor, obliging us to keep in mind his work, thanks to which Szczecin appears on the map of important places in cultural Europe.

The inhabitants of Szczecin first became acquainted with the selection of Bernhard Heiliger's works in 1998, at a posthumous exhibition held by the National Museum. Since 2007, on the square in front of the Old Town Hall - the seat of the Szczecin History Museum - you can see his magnificent sculpture The Great Arch, donated to the museum by the foundation Bernhard Heiliger Stiftung in Berlin.
                                                                                                                                 

By: Bogdana Kozińska