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#52

Vase "Blauer Vogel"

Linck, Margrit (1897-1983) | Künstler:in

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The work "Blue Bird" by the Swiss ceramic artist Margrit Linck was created at the end of the 1940s. It has been part of the museum's collection since 1951. Purchased from the artist, the ceramic sculpture was exhibited in a travelling exhibition at the Wuppertal Museum in January 1952, which was also shown in other German cities. This work has probably never been exhibited before. It is therefore one of the 'unknown treasures' of the museum's collection.


Margrit Linck, born near Bern in 1897, was the first woman in Switzerland to open her own pottery workshop in 1935. Initially, she created handicraft objects in the Bernese tradition, but from the 1950s onwards she developed her own clear programme of white ceramics. Pottery enabled her to support her family. From the mid-1940s she also began her artistic work, which she developed in part from her utility ceramics and whose motifs were at first clearly influenced by Surrealism. This includes the Wuppertal ceramic sculpture 'Blauer Vogel' (Blue Bird), which is somewhere between applied art and sculpture.

In 1949 Linck's works were exhibited at the Kunsthalle Bern, together with Joan Miró and others, which was both an important recognition and an inspiration. New artistic concepts continued to emerge: painted figures, hand-made sculptures reminiscent of early Surrealism, the so-called bird women. With the exception of the twisted vases created in the 1970s, these works were a clear departure from the utilitarian ceramics of classical craftsmanship.

In 2024, the Museum für Gestaltung in Zurich held a major exhibition on Linck as a pioneer of ceramics, which was the first to fully recognise her artistic position.

Material & Technik
Ton
Museum
Von der Heydt Museum
Datierung
späte 1940er Jahre
Inventarnummer
A 1951/26
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