Archivio Conz

Bernard Heidsieck (1928 Paris, France – 2014 Paris) was a French sound poet who merged spoken word with a wide array of recorded material. His artistic career spanned Beat, Fluxus, and Minimalism. Heidsieck began performing his Poèmes-Partitions pieces in the mid-1950s, using typographical spacing to direct his performances. Subsequently, he began using a tape recorder as a supplementary device for writing and retransmitting. As an opponent of passive reading and advocate of active and participatory poetry, Heidsick’s readings often included performance, such as physical gestures or the use of props. From the juxtaposition of phonetic experiments and magnetophonic technologies with tape recording and cut-up techniques, the exploration of a new artistic language was pursued through the rapid development of electronic technology. In total, Bernhard Heidsieck staged over 540 public readings of his works in twenty-four countries. Beginning in 2017, the Centre Pompidou has awarded an annual non-book literary prize in honor of and named after Bernard Heidsieck. Since 2022, the Archivio Conz has partnered with the prize.