For the desire to experiment

5th International porcelain workshop KAHLA Kreativ celebrates crowning closing

On 9th July it was the “finale“ for the 12 participants of the 5th International workshop KAHLA Kreativ. For four weeks the German manufacturer KAHLA Porcelain gave selected international artists the opportunity to develop creative visions for the material porcelain, to experiment and to implement their ideas into porcelain under the motto INVENTURE.

The final presentation of work in the scope of the KAHLA Kreativ forum on 9th July has been preceded by weeks of intensive work and cultural exchange. The daily collaboration of the 12 participants from 9 nations was extremely enriching. More and more the workshop became an international colloquium on the theme of porcelain. "It was exciting to see how this type of work became an intercultural dialogue", enthuses Holger Raithel, managing shareholder of KAHLA/Thüringen Porzellan GmbH.

The creative"s sounded out the potential of porcelain in the KAHLA studios. It is a long time since something new and unimagined came out of kaolin, feldspar and quartz - the elementary components of porcelain. "In the first week the sheer multitude of possibilities here almost smothered me, I couldn"t sleep properly", explains the Swiss ceramicist Eva Aebi. KAHLA made the complete infrastructure available to her and the other eleven participants for their work: they received materials and work space, accommodation and catering, advice and help from KAHLA employees, e.g. modellers, designers and specialists in production. And they were able to use all technical plants - including the glazing plant and kiln. In this way they were able to get closer to the porcelain unencumbered, in order to use it for design oriented or free artistic works.

The participants were selected from 150 applicants from all over the world. The fact that the workshop has now caused an international stir impressively accounts for the high number of applications: It has doubled compared to the 4th KAHLA Kreativ workshop. A top class specialist body made up of journalists and experts selected the participants from the applications. Decision criteria included progressive artistic standard and the courage to experiment - in accordance with this year"s motto INVENTURE. The 12 participants of KAHLA Kreativ came from Switzerland (Eva Aebi, Rebecca Maeder, Chloé Peytermann), France (Anne Xiradakis), Finland (Kirsti Karoliina Taiviola), Poland (Magdalena Gazur), Hungary (Eszter Imre), Russia (Alim Pasht-Han), Serbia (Danijela Pivasevi-Tenner), Taiwan (Mei-Shiu Winde-Liu), the Netherlands (the German, Lisa Charlotte Grahner) and Germany (Johanna Hitzler).

More information, high-resolution images, questions:

KAHLA/Thüringen Porzellan GmbH  
Sheila Rietscher / Katja Endler
Christian-Eckardt-Straße 38 
07768 Kahla/Germany
Phone +49 (0) 3 64 24 • 79-282 
Fax +49 (0) 3 64 24 • 79-283
pr@kahlaporzellan.com
www.kahlaporzellan.com