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The Dutch artist Patula Berm is the designer of exciting dresses, bustiers and wigs. You can’t wear her creations, though – they’re made of glass!

A fascinating aura encompasses her clothing, casting a spell on the observer and sending him or her on a journey replete with fantasy, esprit and poetry.

When Patula Berm works, she’s led by her intuition and associations. Even in the conceptual stage, each of her sculptures subsists on its own special atmosphere, which she then realizes in her creation.

The artist finds inspiration for her work everywhere: the depth of the ocean, the water which forms a type of second skin around the body, the nostalgia of an old movie or even just a particularly magical moment.

In creating her glass clothing on the other hand, she’s often stimulated by common everyday objects: mirrors, coins, silverware, brushes, strands of hair, red peppers or shells. She combines these various materials with her glass creations, thus giving them a completely new meaning.

Patula Berm started coming up with her glass clothing in 1995 in the Amsterdam glass studio Van Tetterode.

The glass museum Alter Hof Herding is extremely pleased to present the works of a single artist again for the first time in a long time. Come and be amazed by the extraordinary pieces on exhibit.

 

Photos:

Patula Berm, Knight in shiny armour, 2007 – Photo AHH

Patula Berm, Mirrow Image, 2002 – Photo Richard Willebrands

Patula Berm, Memories of Lavander, 2007 – Photo Richard Willebrands

Patula Berm, Flying fish, 2007 – Photo Richard Willebrands

Collecting, exhibiting, informing are the main tasks of a museum. In order to fulfil this task, the foundation annually tracks down the trends in modern art. That way it acquires consistently and continuously the glass objects which grade up the collection to an exemplary work exhibition of European glass art. Right at the beginning of the new year the foundation traditionally presents the finding of its collection of the preceding year at its exhibition “New acquisitions”.

Travelling to such significant glass centres of Europe as, for example, Leerdam, Strasbourg and Ebeltoft (Denmark) gave the important impulses to the collection last year among other things. In Leerdam the foundation could acquire two works of Menno Jonker. The Dutchman was nominated to one of the best glass artists of the world in 2001 by the Corning Museum of Glass (USA). His works are appreciated, first of all, because of their technical perfection, the unique language of forms and the innovative handling of the glass material.

At the same time the collection has been increased by many interesting exhibits from the latest special exhibitions “Space 14″ and ” Made in NRW “.

The works of young, experimentally working glass artists from the Academy of Arts in Stuttgart and the works of the established artists who have received the State Price of North Rhine-Westphalia for their special handling of glass are among them.

The foundation is proud that in the course of this exhibition it could take up into the collection the sculpture “Into each other” by Klaus U. Hilsbecher , for which he was awarded the State Price in 2007.

 

Photos:

Carmelo López, Homenage an Goya, 2005 – Photo Ralf Bauer

Menno Jonker, Odi et Amo, 2005.- Photo Horst Kolberg

Hartmann Greb, Neptun verlässt das Meer, 2007 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Mieke Pontier, Clouds II, 2006 – Photo Aad Doorduin

„Each work of art fetches its own material“ – so simple was the answer of a female student of the Institute for Artistic Ceramics and Glass to the question regarding the status of glass in the art. The Institute for Artistic Ceramics and Glass, a department of the Fachhochschule Koblenz, is rather new and located in Höhr-Grenzhausen.

While visiting the only Institute for Artistic Ceramics and Glass in Rheinland-Pfalz, it becomes obvious that the works of the students are determined by the concept and especially by the medium glass. Everybody experiments with his own idea and its realization using the adequate material. On that the prospective artists are tested by their teachers because the language of the material is the language of the work of art and its intention as regards content. The use of glass in the creative process is just as significant as its association with materials unlike glass.

The students of the glass class demonstrate in their works results and interim results on their personal path to the art. In the course of this unusual, fascinating works of art emerge ranging from installations via sculptures up to blown and moulded glass objects. They all reflect the freedom and openness towards glass as an artistic medium.

The Foundation is pleased to present to you in the new exhibition „Experiment Glas“ works of 11 students and graduates of the Institute for Artistic Ceramics and Glass. The young artists are accompanied by the Instutute Director, professor Ingrid Conrad-Lindig, the Head of the Workshop Glass, Thomas Kruck, and the teacher Jean Paul Raymond.

With this special exhibition the Foundation is once again following its tradition to show glass works of students from technical glass colleges and art colleges.

 

Photos:

Petra Sindelar, Experiment II, 2008 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Judith Röder, Faltenwürfe, 2007 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Wladimir Körting, Erinnerung 1, 2006 – Photo AHH

Stanislaw Jan Borowski, Torsi II, 2007 – Photo AHH

Water and Ice – under this title the Glass Museum Alter Hof Herding will present works of the two artists Michael Behrens and Peter Bremers in a new exhibition.

Though the two artists look at the glass in a totally different way, their works show many points of contact. The natural phenomena water and ice, optically very close to the glass, are inexhaustible sources of inspiration for both.

Trips to the Antarctic have deeply impressed the Dutchman Peter Bremers. His monumental sculptures of great presence reflect the stunning aura of the polar ice formations. Ossified in abstract shapes like ice, they appear to rest themselves in an almost contemplative way.

Unforeseeable light fluctuations often lend to the monochrome works a mysterious depth, a hidden shine – one feels like looking inside a glacier.

Diving operations in the underwater world before the coasts of Indonesia inspired Michael Behrens. The young artist from Düsseldorf has introduced new trends in the art of glass: They act amorphous, liquid, appear like water always waving in a soft movement which is not easily comprehensible. The illusion is still intensified when the colours blend within the object. The observer wishes to take hold of the glass and to catch a structure in the diffuse thicket.

Michael Behrens and Peter Bremers brilliantly master the techniques of glass design. Their ice and water landscapes impress with an unparallel dimension and depth.

The foundation is delighted to present with „Water and Ice“ a double exhibition in German-Dutch cooperation.

 

Photos:

Michael Behrens, Underwater-World 91-2008 – Photo Paul Niessen

Michael Behrens, Underwater-World 89-2008 – Photo Paul Niessen

Peter Bremers, I&P 07-114, 2007 – Photo Paul Niessen

Peter Bremers, AS 02-19, 2002 – Photo Paul Niessen

The artist Franz Xaver Höller (born in 1950 in Leopoldsdorf, Bavaria) is one of the masters of his genre. Being rooted in a long glass-tradition, the shape of the vessel still plays the decisive part in his work. Even though he is tempted again and again by the unrestricted sculpture, it is mostly mugs, bowls and topped vessels that come into being in his studio – yet not for usage.

And that is what makes his work so fascinating. Indeed, the shapes are borrowed from the familiar traditional glass for usage, but its sense he interprets anew. The creations belong to themselves, they have become autonomous.

 Thus, there is something unspeakable, metaphysical in his works that goes beyond the substantial. Höller takes vision and inspiration from nature’s phenomena. Rhythm and polarity, the perpetual returning and yet at the same time never equal manifestations of life are leitmotifs: day and night, life and death and over and over again pairs that, like two poles, are drawn together or pushed off from one another, symbolizing the binding and separating in unity.

 Franz Xaver Höller is successful in the artistic execution of these interrelations, because of his disciplined and at the same time forceful and wilful iconography. The magical interplay between light and glass is particularly decisive. Höller especially dedicates much attention to the surface treatment, like grinding and engraving, as it coins atmosphere and charisma of the piece of work. By designing the surface he overcomes superficiality and opens a view for profoundness.

Franz Xaver Höller is a professional artist par excellence. He went through all stages: master craftsman as polisher for cupped glass, learned glass-designer, studies of glass-design and sculpture at the art academy in Munich, freelance artist, director of workshops, amongst others at the Corning Glass Museum in New York and at the Australian National University in Canberra. Since 1981 he has been working as academic at the Public Professional Glass-School in Zwiesel.

The glass museum Alter Hof Herding is proud to be able to present the lifework of Franz Xaver Höller to you with this exhibition.

 

Photos:

Franz X. Höller, Deckelgefäß 260, 2007 – Photo Franz X. Höller

Franz X. Höller, Paar-VIII (234), 2003 – Photo Franz X. Höller

Franz X. Höller, Objekt (271), 2008 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Franz X. Höller, Deckelgefäß 239, 2003 – Photo Horst Kolberg

As every year the Foundation has again visited many artists, galleries, exhibitions and academies in 2008 at home and abroad as well. The objective in this connection is always to discover current trends and developments of the international glass art.

The „flying visit“ to the London art exhibition Collect – a real treasure trove, has become a habit to get acquainted with works of young artists outside Europe. The Foundation is therefore delighted to present to you, among others, unusually worked glass pieces of three young Australians, Tali Dalton, Nicole Ayliffe and Tavita Havea.

A trip to the Czech Republic turned to be particularly worth seeing and worthwhile. A Highlight was certainly Prague, the centre of contemporary glass art. At the Academy for Art, Architecture and Design in Prague one meets promising young artists who deal with the glass in a convincing manner.

The Foundation could also acquire works of significant Czech artists like Jaromir Rybak, Ronny Plesl and Jan Fišar. There was an interesting meeting in Prague with Bohumil Elias junior, who is succeeding as a young glass artist his famous father who has unfortunately died in the meantime. His works are nonetheless very independent – massive, extensive monuments that let one forget how fragile the material glass is in reality.

In addition to these external acquisitions the collection has also been enlarged through new acquisitions from the own exhibitions of the year 2008. The Foundation acquired, among others, two dresses of the Dutch artist Patula Berm. Her exhibition “My dresses“ became the darling of the public. “Mirrow Image“ is permanently being exhibited at the Concert Theater Coesfeld, “Memories of Lavander“ can be admired at the Glass Museum Alter Hof Herding. Even exhibits from the students’ exhibition “Experiment Glass“ of the Institute for Artistic Ceramics and Glass in Höhr-Grenzhausen have also found a place in the glass collection like works of Peter Bremers and Michael Behrens. Their exhibition “Water and ice“ was presented by the Glass Museum for a few weeks in light and colours and caused such a sensation that the number of visitors attained a new record.

Share with us an exciting and varied new exhibition!

 

Photos:

Nicole Ayliffe, Vinyard, 1997 – Photo Michal Kluvanek

Tali Dalton, Memories, 2007 – Photo Jeremy Dillon

Jaromir Rybak, Schale mit Fischen, 2005 – Photo AHH

Bohumil Elias jr., Under the depht, 2008 – Photo Gabriel Urbánek

What can be discovered on the other side of the abstraction? No simple answer because abstraction describes the process that filters out the general and conceptual from the concrete discernible and representational or removes the important from the unimportant. The three artists from the Netherlands, Simsa Cho, Menno Jonker and Winnie Teschmacher, confront themselves with this task. What you do not see, they interpret with brilliant works in a completely different manner. Despite high abstraction the themes of their works are discernible. They reveal to the observer sometimes playful, sometimes seriously and at all times satisfying the material.

Simsa Cho was born 1962 in Chiba, Japan. After taking his course at Tama Art University he moved to Amsterdam to the Rietveld Akademie. In the meantime, he has found his way beyond the big Dutch gallery circles. Poetic, sometimes romancing, Simsa Cho draws the artistic language from the rich source of the unconscious. His unconventional sculptures that he often combines with other materials tell mysterious stories, from time to time with humor and irony.

Menno Jonker, born 1968 in Castricum in the Netherlands, turned to glass as an artistic medium not until1997. Nonetheless, already in 2001 he was nominated as the best glass artists of the world by the Corning Museum of Glass (U.S.A). His works are appreciated due to their perfection, the unique shape language and the innovative dealing with the material glass. The organic, adaptable shapes of his objects encourage the observer to give way to his haptical tendencies and to feel the harmonic contours. This way they have a strong emotional force that underline the intensive, unusual shades of color. Menno Jonke’s artistic language acts lyrical and he thoroughly declares his support for the aesthetics of the glass.

Winnie Teschmacher, born 1958 in Rotterdam, can look back on a long-standing and widespread experience with the material glass. After studying at the Academy of the Fine Arts in Rotterdam and at the Free Academy in the Hague she opened her own glass studio already in 1983. As a freelance artist and designer she was active for several glass factories. In her artistic work she advances like a mystic to the core of the things. In the course of this works come into being from a clear, rational architecture the shape language of which congenially combines harmony, calmness and spirituality.

The Ernsting Stiftung is delighted to introduce these three unusual artists to you in the new exhibition „Beyond Abstraction“.

 

Photos:

Simsa Cho, Twilight Energy, 2002 – Photo Ron Zijlstra

Menno Jonker, Atlantic Ridge Crater, 2007 – Photo Jeroen van der Spek

Winnie Teschmacher, Equillibrium 1, 2006 – Photo AHH

Winnie Teschmacher, Light of the soul, 2007 – Photo Louis Sonderegger

Freedom, vision and sovereignity are essential to follow an independent path. The glass department at the Instituut voor Kunst en Ambacht im belgischen Mechelen meets this challenge at a high level. In the course of this, it has achieved a pioneering work because there was no tradition in the free glass art and glass development prior to its foundation in the year 1985 and consequently no highly developed glass history and studio glass movement. It is admirable that the teachers and students at the IKA treat the artistic medium glass freely and self-consciously and are not bogged down – neither in classical craftsmanship traditions nor in artistic experiments. And it is not amazing that an „IKA Style“ has not developed as yet. Flemish glass shows today a vivid cheerfulness, openness and variety.

Promoting the particular artistic potential of each student constitutes the center of attention of the training. Candidates from different countries, among them also already trained artists, enroll themselves at the IKA. An innovative, inspiring atmosphere has developed in this way in which ideas, backgrounds and working methods mix together and cross-fertilise mutually. At the technical craftsmanship level the IKA conveys an unusual well-founded training. Currently, all essential disciplines in the hot glass range are being taught (e.g. blowing, molding or fusing) and in the cold processing (among others engraving, grinding, polishing).

The students in Mechelen are confronted with the demanding artistic task to find and to define the delicate equilibrium between aesthetics, expression and technology. How extraordinarily they master this balancing work is demonstrated by their works. Installations, sculptures, flat glass or mixed media designs, blown and molded objects – all of them reflect the high technical and aesthetic standard of the IKA.

The Foundation is therefore delighted to present to you in the new exhibition „Een eigenzinnige weg“ works of 14 students and graduates of the glass department of the IKA Mechelen. They will be accompanied by Sandra De Clerk, who has been supervising the glass department since 2002.

 

Photos:

Sylvie Van den Bosch, Manu´tribute seed, 2009 –  Photo AHH

Olivier Devos, Fluide, 2008 – Photo AHH

Paul Funcken, Casa Vetro 1, 2008 – Photo Studio Hentschel

Mai Renders, o.T., 2008 – Photo Mai Renders

“Working with glass teaches discipline, respect and patience, but if you get involved with it you get a type of colorful message full of energy, love and hope“, the way the artist Anne Hein describes her work with the medium glass – a message that also achieves its goal while looking at the glass art. Anne Hein belongs to the great young talents of the actual glass scene. She received several prizes in the past years, in 2007 she received, e.g. the state prize of the federal state Rheinland-Pfalz. Her works attract through an incredible tenderness; bowls that remember to fine woven fabrics though it is difficult to conceive that they were made out a type of glass slurry.

The Foundation has also met many innovative artists on the international floor during the past year. While visiting the exhibition „Connections“ in Prague one could come to know the works of the Danish woman Pipaluk Lake. She is an extremely creative artist, fascinated from the almost inexhaustible possibilities that result through the combination between glass, metal and other elements. „What would have been if..?“ – the question is her most important motivation during the creation process. The Foundation discovered on its trips with great pleasure: Glass as artistic medium evokes in fine artists a growing, intensive interest. For this, the Mexican artist Rebeca Huerta Viga left even her native country to exercise her work with glass at the Glass Centre in Prague under professional conditions.

The Foundation has also made artistic new discoveries in 2009 during own exhibitions in the Glass Museum. Through their free, refreshing handling with glass students of the glass departments of the IKA Mechelen, (Belgium) also the visitors – the show „Een eigenzinnige weg“ developed itself to the absolute darling of the public! The Dutch artist Winnie Teschmacher, who together with Simsa Cho and Menno Jonker devoted herself to the exhibition topic abstraction and surprised everybody with the clear, reposing architecture of her glass objects. Apart from that, the Foundation could purchase some of the unusual hollow-wares of the renowned artist Franz Xaver Höller, who said about his exhibition „Form – Wandel“ that it is a milestone of his artistic career. This show compiled the subjects of his lifework and opened at the same time the door to new works with optical glass.

Look forward to a staggering new exhibition with a cross-section of the ongoing glass art scene and artists about whom one would like to say Stars on the rise!

 

Photos:

Rebeca Huerta Viga, Infinity Spring, 2008 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Pipaluke Lake, Carry away I, 2008 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Anne Hein, Diabolo, 2009 – Photo AHH

František Janak, Capricorn, 2005 – Photo Frantisek Janák