Tücher und Bücher – Hein Kohn (1907–1979)

The special exhibition Tücher and Bücher. From Augsburg to the Netherlands is dedicated to the remarkable life of the Jewish publisher, literary agent and cultural mediator Hein Kohn. It tells a story of courage, cultural responsibility and an extraordinary journey from Augsburg into exile.

“He printed what the Nazis burned in 1933.” (Gernot Römer)

Hein Kohn republished literature that had been banned and burned in Nazi Germany, thereby preserving an essential part of Germany’s intellectual and cultural heritage.

Beginning with the Kohn family, rooted in Augsburg since the nineteenth century, the exhibition traces Hein Kohn’s training in the textile and book trades, his lifelong connection to Bertolt Brecht, his flight into exile in the Netherlands in 1933, and the founding of influential exile publishing houses. There, he became one of the country’s first literary agents. At the same time, the exhibition demonstrates how Jewish entrepreneurship, literary networks and cultural resistance were closely intertwined in exile.

The accompanying book, edited by curator Dr Ingvild Richardsen and published by Volk Verlag in Munich, expands on the exhibition and situates Hein Kohn’s work within the history of literary exile and German–Dutch cultural relations.

Special exhibition and accompanying programme at the Brechthaus Augsburg
13 February – 31 December 2026

The exhibition and the accompanying book are realised with the financial support of the Ilse Blank-Mezger-Hesselberger Foundation.