CERAMICS - A LIFELONG PASSION Collection Peter Siemsson Foundation

Siemssen, Peter

"Every piece of his belongs in a museum"
Gilbert Portanier and other highlights of contemporary ceramics in the Siemssen Collection

"Living with Ceramics" - that is the motto of Peter Siemssen, the "creative entrepreneur", who, through working with the Rosenthal Porcelain Company, became an avid collector of art ceramics and a committed promoter of young ceramicists. Over the years he has amassed one of the best internationally oriented collections of contemporary Studio Ceramics. For the first time, highlights of the Peter Siemssen Foundation are presented to the public by ARNOLDSCHE Art Publishers and the Peter Siemssen Foundation in a comprehensive publication.

In sumptuous colour illustrations, the book - structured on geographical lines - showcases Japanese, German, Scandinavian, western European, North American and Mediterranean ceramics in a broad range of significant works. A great deal of space has been devoted to the one-off works of Bjørn Wiinblad, Tatsuzo Shimaoka and Antoni Cumella. The high point, however, is the work of the French art ceramicist Gilbert Portanier, with whom Peter Siemssen has forged particularly intensive artistic and personal ties and on whose "painterly ceramics" Picasso passed the uncontested verdict: "Every piece of his belongs in a museum." And Portanier does inimitably conjure Surrealist, abstract-figurative paintings rich in colour on the ceramics he designs.

Supplementing the colour illustrations, which are in large formats and faithfully reproduce the individual pieces, interpreting texts, artist biographies and the recollections Peter Siemssen relates in such a lively manner make art ceramics from the latter half of the 20th century completely accessible. Moreover, distinguished specialists in the field contribute memorably pertinent and readable texts. A standard work that should not be missing from the library of any aficionado or collector of contemporary ceramics.