Bethel - As if his hands were speaking

It's Thursday morning and work has begun in the creative workshop in Lobetal. Heinz-Jürgen Heinze has just arrived. His carer walks close behind him and holds him. After a few steps, Heinz-Jürgen Heinze moves away from him, feels his way to the table, then to the chair and sits down. The senior is as good as blind.

His work table in the creative workshop has already been prepared. Heinz-Jürgen Heinze picks up the objects lying on the table in front of him one by one and feels them. Three blocks of reddish-brown clay lie in front of him. He pulls a wooden base towards him, selects the appropriate tool from the container in front of him and begins to work the clay. Heinz-Jürgen Heinze is completely at one with himself.

The artist smoothes a piece of clay with a rolling pin; he checks it with his fingers, rolls it even thinner, then cuts out a triangle and forms spheres. It looks as if he is working directly from his innermost being, from his soul, as if his hands are talking to the material. His fingers are his eyes. They are long and sensitive. Forms emerge. Heinz-Jürgen Heinze has a precise image in his head of what he wants to create. What effect might his finished work have on future viewers? That doesn't seem to matter to him. Only one thing counts: What he creates is his happiness in life. After all, it is also his unique means of expression, through which he also communicates.

The first clay works are finished and the astonished looks of those present are directed towards him. Heinz-Jürgen Heinze has modelled a traffic sign with an accompanying pedestrian crossing. With the help of sounds and movements, he shows that his work is intended to represent the view of a car driver at the wheel. While everyone puzzles over how he could even perceive it in this way, the artist continues to work. Under his skilful hands, the traffic lights are being created. The 72-year-old then also comments on it with sounds and finger movements that represent the flashing of the traffic lights.