Morris Nitsun 1943-2022

Morris was an NHS clinical psychologist for 52 years, internationally renowned group analyst, and talented artist. Each of these would have been a full career for most people, but he pursued them simultaneously and inhabited each fully, making contributions that have been important to people in all three worlds.

Born and educated in South Africa, he came to the UK in 1968 and joined the Goodmayes Psychology Department in Outer London in 1969. As Head of Department from 1973 – 2001 he attracted and nurtured more than one generation of young psychologists who went on to make significant contributions in their respective fields. While he himself was primarily psychoanalytic in his orientation, he had the breadth of vision and intellectual flexibility to welcome those with different approaches; cognitive behavioural, systemic, cognitive analytic. He was keen for group work, and for a psychological presence in primary care to provide easier community access for patients. Within the department Morris established regular academic seminars for internal and external speakers, set up complex case discussion groups and created a vibrant and lively work environment where psychologists felt privileged to work and blossomed in the most stimulating and creative professional environment.

In 1990 he qualified as a group analyst. In 1996 he published his first book The Anti-Group: Destructive Forces and Their Creative Potential which was immediately recognised as a major theoretical contribution to the understanding of groups. This was followed in 2006 by his second book – The Group as an Object of Desire.  

With the international recognition and invitations to speak and run workshops in the US, Europe and Israel, Morris resigned as Head of Department at Goodmayes so that he could devote more time to his interest and expertise is group work. From 2001-2020 this was through a part-time NHS role in Camden and Islington as well as at the former Group Analytic Practice and later the Fitzrovia Group Practice and through his group analytic teaching. In his NHS role he taught and supervised newly qualified psychologists and CBT therapists as well as group psychotherapists, including attracting NHS London funding to run a diploma course for IAPT staff in group work.

Morris' third book, Beyond the Anti-Group, published in 2015, contains examples of his work and thinking in this period. Chapters on NHS psychotherapy groups with patients with multiple difficulties and the contribution of group analytic thinking to CBT groups run alongside issues in private analytic groups. The real interest, warmth and optimism he showed equally to all he came in contact with in whatever context, whether as patient, supervisee or indeed friend, while being attentive to and fully embracing the real difficulties they faced, shines through the chapters of this book.

In 2016, in recognition of his contribution to group work in mental health, Morris was awarded the Royal College of Psychiatrists President's Medal. Morris was justly proud of this award, which was most unusual to be awarded to a psychologist and is a testament to the way he was able to transcend the unfortunately all too common splits between different tribes in mental health.

As a young man in South Africa, Morris Nitsun studied art as well as psychology and in 1966 was a prize winner in the South African Artists of Fame and Promise Competition. Throughout his psychology and psychotherapy careers he continued to paint, exhibit and sell his paintings, which with their vibrant colours and rich textures brought pleasure to the homes of many colleagues and friends and lovers of fine art. His final book A Psychotherapist Paints and his personal article with the same name in the December issue of The Psychologist, describe a fascinating project where people in a group discussed their reactions to some rather darker paintings of his on specific themes. He was very excited about this coming together of his artist and psychologist selves and was full of further creative ideas and potential collaborators to develop this when sadly he died unexpectedly and suddenly in November 2022.

Morris had a remarkable capacity to see the potential in others which required perspicacity, generosity and self confidence. This permitted him to promote the careers and work of others without ever seeing himself as being in competition with them. In his life outside his work, Morris was a very sociable man, who took friendship seriously, keeping in contact with and showing a keen interest in the lives of his friends at the same time as being amusing and such good fun. He was generous with presents too, giving gifts for the baby to the plethora of women psychologists who had children on his watch, and generous with his paintings too. So many of us have them on our walls to remember him by.

John Cape, Janice Hiller, Winifred Bolton
London

What a sad irony that Morris's article 'A Psychotherapist Paints' was published in the December issue of The Psychologist, just a few weeks before he suddenly and tragically died. In the piece Morris had discussed the tension within him between his 'Psychologist' self and his 'Artist' self – he had a special talent for both, and perhaps somewhat prophetically at the end of the article he concluded that at last 'the artist and the psychologist in me had come together'.

Morris profoundly changed the course of my life in 1978 by offering me a training post in his department at Goodmayes Hospital, recognising something in me, from a business background, against fierce competition. I later came to see that Morris, immensely talented and creative himself, had a knack for spotting potential in others. Goodmayes turned out to be a breeding ground for Clinical Psychologists who all went on to achieve great things in their respective fields. The appreciation and generosity of spirit that he recalled from his mother, he gave to those in his employ, fostering a capacity for growth in all of us.

Morris was one of those people who made an immense and immediate impression on all who came into his orbit. Obviously highly intelligent, erudite and creative, it was perhaps his capacity to see the humour in all of life that was so endearing. We will all remember his head slightly tilted to the side with a wry smile as he reflected on something slightly ridiculous in a situation – but there was a warmth always there that deflected any potential for slight.

Although Morris's orientation was primarily psychanalytic, he had a deep respect and openness for other orientations and this was reflected both in the nature of the department he built at Goodmayes and in the network of colleagues and friends he stayed close to throughout his working life. His work as an Artist also grew through his working life as manifested by the growing maturity and popularity of his Exhibitions, and I do believe his latest work, in his late 70's, was his finest, and some of that immense artistic talent was available for all to see in The Psychologist.

He will be missed and remembered with fondness by all who knew him.

John Spector
Consultant Clinical Psychologist
London

I read 'A psychotherapist paints' with very mixed emotions. Firstly, it was a reminder of the creative and articulate mind of a man who had been my personal mentor during the first years of the new millennium. I am also one of the lucky few to have an original Nitsun painting on my wall at home (a still life with flowers in a vase on a dark background).

Morris taught me so much about the tensions between the darker, anti-life side of the human condition alongside the love and the creative forces that shape us. I had the good fortune in 2002 to take over his old job as the head of psychological services in the Redbridge borough of Northeast London, and then had the unique opportunity to work with my predecessor as he remained part time with us a group analyst and supervisor. We were very conscious of the potential for father-son tensions and rivalries in our relationship, but this awareness actually only further enriched our creativity and friendship.

The sadness comes from the fact that only just before reading this illuminating biographical piece from Morris based on his new book, I had learned from a colleague that he had died. Especially as we had not been in touch for a few years, I felt compelled to write this brief homage to show my gratitude to Morris as a mentor, psychological practitioner, artist, and observer of the human condition. His last book makes clear the links between art and psychology that we all have felt but have not so wisely articulated. His influence will certainly live on in me and so many others.

Martin Seager
Consultant Clinical Psychologist/Adult Psychotherapist