Under the title “Ceramics between time and space”, Gmunden aims to continue to live up to its already established reputation as a city of ceramics on a contemporary level. Here, projects between art and craft, theory and practice, inspiration and innovation come together. The result is a sustainable Austrian competence center for ceramics that creates international relevance – from the Salzkammergut!
With its wide range of offerings, Gmunden will become a center for established and future ceramics experts as well as for ceramics enthusiasts and viewers from Austria and abroad. All of the planned initiatives are about awakening the interests of and involving the residents of the Salzkammergut as well as artists and guests from all over the world. A committed public commitment to the focus on ceramics in a historical and contemporary context.
Speculative tradition
Ceramic objects are particularly suitable for preserving a cultural heritage. This has to do with the fact that ceramic objects have surrounded us every day for thousands of years. Our cultures, our heritages and our histories are therefor continuously inscribed in them through use. Due to its material properties and its durability, fragmented objects being excavated and exhumed after thousands of years in the earth share these histories with us today. In addition there is a rich in heritage of ceramic techniques which still is alive.
Many artists working with ceramic materials relate their work to this tradition not in order to keep tradition alive but to correlate it with the world of today. In this sense the reference to ceramic tradition is not only an opportunity to dissect and analyse our pasts furthermore it raises questions about the contemporary world. The interest or appreciation shown for ceramics these days will also bring up the question to what extents ceramics have the potential to speculate about possible futures in our relation to these materials with all their historic qualities.
Progamme
10:00 Greetings by Mayor Stefan Krapf and Head of Cultural Affairs Dr Andreas Hecht
10:30 Introduction Day #1 by Dr. Rainald Franz, Curator and ceramics specialist
11:00 Giles Round
12:00 Liz Craft
13:00 Lunch break
14:00 Matthew Lutz Kinoy
15:00 Thu-Van Tran
16:00 Future perspectives by Genoveva Rückert & Veronika Schreck (OÖ Landes-Kultur GmbH)
16:30 Panel discussion led by Dr. Rainald Franz, Curator and ceramics specialist
Revolutionary Tradition (Radical openness)
Artists can approach and work with the medium of clay from a wide variety of attitudes. For some, it is a material who’s specialist, more technical approach is the key to its artistic outcome. For others, the ceramic material is a conceptual world of its own, in which it represents its own value to discover new things again and again. But there are also artist using the qualities of the ceramic materials in their work without even touching clay. Instead these artists cooperate with specialised companies which produce their work.
A crucial point to look at will be the use of modern, and specially digital techniques. Clay has been regarded as a counterweight to increasing digitisation because touching clay connects us to the surrounding material world in a way nearly no other material can. So the current popularity of clay is a result of the lack of experience of materiality. On the other side there is an increasing number of artists researching and sharing on new techniques which can create a competence and sensibility of medium which can bolster and support these artistic positions.
Since there are no right or wrong ways to approach the material of clay here, nor one specific way of working with it, the aim of the second day will be to show a range of cultural attitudes, positions, and artistic practices which push clay to new limits, exploring new approaches to working with the material.
Programm
10:00 Introduction Day #2 by Ranti Tjan, Curator and ceramics specialist
11:00 Lindsey Mendick
12:00 Jennifer Teets
13:00 Lunch break
14:00 Mire Lee
15:00 Isabelle Andriessen
16:00 Panel discussion led by Ranti Tjan, Curator and ceramics specialist
