The New Institute for Dramatic Writing, NIDS, was founded in 2014 with the aim of bringing the social significance of the dramatic arts back into public awareness and strengthening an art form whose original function is to foster a culture of critical engagement.
We place great value on independently thinking and writing authors, and our aim is to support and accompany them on their path towards artistic self-confidence. We are also committed to advancing a stronger presence of diversity. This responds to the need for a theatre capable of representing the international character of contemporary society and willing to draw its greatest potential from the richness of different cultural backgrounds. Our goal is to reclaim dramatic art as a force capable of creating a vibrant public sphere and of reasserting its artistic and social relevance.
Meet the people
Maxi Obexer
Maxi Obexer, playwright and author. Born and raised in South Tyrol, Italy, lives in Berlin. She studied comparative literature, philosophy and theater studies in Vienna and Berlin. Several of her numerous plays have won awards and have been staged worldwide. Among them Das Geisterschiff [Ghost Ship] and Illegale Helfer [Illegal Helpers] (Robert Geisendörfer Prize 2016 and Eurodram Prize 2016).
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With her novel “Europe’s Longest Summer” she was nominated for the Bachmann Prize in 2017. Her latest play “Im Auge des Sturms. Das Kapitol im Januar 2021” (Kammerspiele München, WDR 2025) was awarded the Radio Play of the Year 2024. Maxi Obexer was awarded the Alice Salomon Poetry Award 2023.
In addition to numerous essays on the animal-human relationship (DLF), she published the novel “Unter Tieren” (2024) and “Odysseus Hund” (2025) with Weissbooks Verlag.
Visiting professor at US universities, including Dartmouth College and Georgetown University in Washington DC, as well as at the German Literature Institute in Leipzig and the UDK in Berlin.