Langenthal retrospective / Musée Ariana, Geneva, Switzerland
Langenthal retrospective / Musée Ariana, Geneva, Switzerland May 23 - November 25, 2012
The studio was also the centre for artistic collaborations with external designers, painters and sculptors. In 1993, in order to revive the market and to adapt to developments in tableware, the company launched the concept Bopla! The principle is a simple one : to produce annual series based on simple forms with brightly-coloured printed motifs by famous designers. The principle of the collection adapted to tableware makes it possible to create composite and evolving series.
Today, the range of products offered by the manufactory and made in the Czech Republic is mainly targeted at hotels and restaurants and responds to the contemporary taste for stylised forms and minimalist designs.
#2 Langenthal revisited Within the context of the exhibition devoted to the Langenthal porcelain manufactory, the Musée Ariana has invited five ceramists to offer their uninhibited artistic vision of this company, through a piece of work created specially for the occasion : Müller-B, Margareta Daepp, Magdalena Gerber, Michèle Rochat and Paul Scott. In 1990, the Zurich ceramist Müller-B (1953-) spent a month at the Bernese manufactory. During her stay, she took the traditional forms produced there, in particular the coffee pots, which now belong to a past era (the development of coffee-making machines has rendered this utensil obsolete), in order to reinterpret them and to produce an installation entitled “Heisser Kaffee” (Hot Coffee). The artist will propose a larger-scale vision of this conceptual work. It is also the form of the coffee pot, in this case, the elegant Landi mocha coffee maker of the 1940s, that Margareta Daepp (1959-) has taken as a basis for her work. Here, the container has disappeared and from this gesture belonging to the past only the content remains, the aromatic coffee that pours in a perfect trajectory from the spout of the pot to fill the cup. The content has become object and everything surrounding it – the social ritual of drinking coffee inpleasant company, just like the Langenthal porcelain – seems to have evaporated. With “Dschinn”, Magdalena Gerber (1966-), questions in a politico-poetic manner the disappearance of artistic and traditional savoir-faire in Swiss porcelain production. Totemic piles of Langenthal chinaware are covered with a froth of bone china porcelain, which softens the contours of the pieces, recalling the cargoes of Chinese porcelain lost at sea. Oscillating between beauty and ugliness, “Dschinn” associates industrial rigor and random form in sculptures from which a transparent cloud escapes – the spirit of a bottle. Michèle Rochat (1971-) has worked for several years on ceramic decoration, attempting by different means to bring to light daily objects by taking a fresh look at them. Here, she adapts as her starting point a decorative frieze from a Langenthal service, which she disproportionately enlarges before reproducing it on a set of plates. Each piece bears a random decorative fragment that only makes sense when the whole series is juxtaposed. The British artist, Paul Scott (1953-) is the only foreign ceramist in the group. For the Musée Ariana, he has recycled plates from a blue and white Langenthal service found at the flea market in Geneva. Onto these, using a transfer-printing process, he has transposed landscapes comprising the four Swiss nuclear power stations : Beznau, Gösgen, Mühleberg and Leibstadt, as well as elements taken from old engravings, in a critical and provocative juxtaposition that combines an idyllic vision of Switzerland and contemporary reality. Hours: Thursday-Sunday, 10 am – 6 pm. Closed on Mondays. Curators Anne-Claire Schumacher, Curator [email protected]
Ana Quintero Chatelanat, Research Assistant [email protected]
Exhibition design Roland Aeschlimann assisted by Jean-Marc Cherix
Cultural Interpretation Hélène de Ryckel, Head of Cultural Interpretation [email protected] CONTACT Christine Azconegui Suter Head of Communication and Promotion Tel +41 22 418 54 55 Fax +41 22 418 54 51 [email protected] Musée Ariana Avenue de la Paix 10 1202 Geneva Switzerland www.ville-geneve.ch/ariana Above (first): Vases, 1958, 1959. Printed striations in grey enamel and gold. Height 16.5 cm max. Collection Musée Ariana, Geneva. Photo by Mauro Magliani and Barbara Piovan. Above (second): Margareta Daepp, 2012, Resin, Height 19 cm, Collection of the artist. Photo by Dominique Uldry, Berne.