Josef Frank (1885-1967)

Josef Frank was an Austrian-born architect and designer known for his contributions to the Swedish interior firm Svenskt Tenn. His furniture, fabrics, and lighting are both elegant and whimsical. Frank worked as an architect while in Austria and designed furniture and accessories for the firm Haus und Garten. Frank helped to define modern Viennese design through his design principles, and by collaborating with other Austrian architects. This collaboration culminated in the “Neues Weiner Wolmen”, or “New Viennese Living” group. The group started in the 1920s and rejected regimented ways of arranging interiors. For example, they believed that a home should be comprised of many different objects, rather than furniture suites; items should look unique but remain adaptable. 

Josef Frank decided to leave Austria in 1933, following the rise of Nazism. His wife, Anna, was Swedish. Estrid Ericsson first ordered furniture designed by Josef Frank in 1932, so it was natural that Frank took a job with Svenskt Tenn in 1934. Although Frank and Ericsson’s collaboration was successful, Frank was still committed to architecture; he moved to New York in 1938 to pursue public housing projects. This endeavor was not fruitful, but he worked as a professor at the New School and stayed in New York until 1946. He began designing for Svenskt Tenn again the same year and remained with them until his retirement. 

Svenskt Tenn had produced subdued, functionalist pieces before Ericsson hired Frank. They sold both furniture and objects, but most of their pieces were made of pewter, or pewter paired with darkly stained wood. Frank brought color and light to Svenskt Tenn. His work referenced traditional European furniture, but with a bolder edge. He continued to design based on the principles he established with New Viennese Living but came to coin his design approach “Accidentalism”. In a 1956 essay for the Swedish magazine Form, he wrote “we should design our surroundings as if they originated by chance.”. He rejected modernism’s uniformity and proposed a future in which people do not decorate based on a set of rules, but instead choose diverse objects and arrange them functionally. Josef Frank’s textiles, furniture, and lighting illustrate Frank’s ingenuity and push-back against straight-laced modernism. 

Find items by Josef Frank and other Svenskt Tenn designers here.

Literature: 

Long, Christopher. “Josef Frank’s Modernist Vision: ‘Accidentism’.” Places Journal, 1 Feb. 2018, placesjournal.org/article/josef-franks-modernist-vision-accidentism/?cn-reloaded=1. 

Rawsthorn, Alice. “Josef Frank: Celebrating the Anti-Design Designer.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 19 Jan. 2016, www.nytimes.com/2016/01/20/arts/design/josef-frank-celebrating-the-anti-design-designer.html.

 

Johnny Mattsson (1906-1970)

Johnny Mattsson was a sculptor and art handicraftsman with a singular ability to bring out stunning shapes from wood. He lived and worked in small Swedish town Gävle and got his breakthrough in 1952 with his beautiful bowls, often inspired by birds and boats. He worked with different kinds of wood like teak and pear, and often pine salvaged from 17th and 18th century houses that were taken down in Gävle.

Thorwald Alef (1896-1974)

Thorwald Alef was a painter and sculptor from Jönköping in southern Sweden. He was educated at Althins Målarskola and at The Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm during the years 1917 to 1922. He is represented at Nationalmuseum, among others. His public works include a bust of Ragnar Östberg at Stockholm City Hall, the sculpture “Musica” at Wennergren Center and “Smålandsflickorna” in Jönköping. Thorwald Alef collaborated with Estrid Ericson and designed a number of decorative items for Svenskt Tenn in the late 1920s.

Literature: Estrid Ericson – Svenska arkitekter och formgivare. Christian Björk, Orosdi-Back, 2011

Anders B. Liljefors (1923-1970)

Anders B. Liljefors was a Swedish ceramicist, sculptor and painter. He spent a total of ten years at Gustavsberg, first from 1947 to 1953 and secondly from 1955 to 1957. At Gustavsberg he revolutionized the perspective on stoneware with his free form creations, opening for stoneware to be considered art as well as arts and crafts.

He studied sculpture at Edward Berggrens Målarskola for Ivar Jonsson, painting at Målarskolan for Isaac Grünewald, and at Det Kongelige Danske Kunstakademi in Copenhagen. After starting his employment at Gustavsberg in 1947, he quickly gained a reputation as an eccentric, both in regards to his production and as a person. He soon got his own studio, where he developed a very personal style. It stood in stark contrast to the artistic ideas of Wilhelm Kåge, Berndt Friberg and Stig Lindberg, who strived for perfection in forms and glazes.  Nonetheless, his first separate exhibition at NK in 1952 was a success.

During his second period at Gustavsberg, Anders B. Liljefors started experimenting with casting ceramics in sand, a technique that gave his stoneware distinctive surfaces and forms. The pieces were often decorated with the glazes that the Wilhelm Kåge, Berndt Friberg and Stig Lindberg had deemed substandard. The new ceramics were presented in an exhibition in 1956 and while they represented a revolution in stoneware, all critics and connoisseurs were not charmed. For many, the bulky forms and “slimy” glazes were too far from the prevalent artistic ideals. However, Liljefors’ work foreboded a freer, more artistic future for ceramics. In the early 1960s Bengt Berglund continued on the same path and is considered Anders B. Liljefors’ spiritual heir.

Following his time at Gustavsberg, Anders B. Liljefors set up his own ceramic studios in Roslagen outside Stockholm and in Blekinge in the south of Sweden. He died unexpectedly from a heart attack at a ceramics’ symposium in Hungary in 1970.

His production included vases, bowls, birds, abstract sculptures, wall reliefs etc. His public works include a 450 m² ceramic wall relief in Folkets Hus in Stockholm, created in collaboration with Signe Persson-Melin between 1959 and 1960. He is represented at Nationalmuseum, Röhsska muséet and Victoria and Albert Museum, among others.

Literature: Gustavsberg: Porslinet, Fabriken, Konstnärerna. Gösta Arvidsson, Norstedts, 2007

Henning Koppel (1918-1981)

Henning Koppel’s pioneering, organic designs in silver for Georg Jensen are in timeless demand with their bold, magnificently executed plastic forms. His creations for Georg Jensen and Bing & Grøndahl are classics of Scandinavian Modern design.

Koppel originally studied sculpture under professor Einar Utzon-Frank at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts’ School of Sculpture in 1936–37, followed by studies at Académie Ranson in Paris from 1938 to 1939. He lived in Sweden during the Second World War, like many other Danes with Jewish roots, and took up jewelry making during that period. Following his return to Denmark in 1945, he was tied to Georg Jensen. Henning Koppel’s unique artistic expression fused with the traditional craftsmanship methods mastered at Georg Jensen, and he emerged as an accomplished silver artist, creating jewelry, hollowware and cutlery.

From 1961 until his death in 1981, Henning Koppel was also tied to Bing & Grøndahl Porcelænsfabrik, where he created tableware.

Among Koppel’s awards are the Lunning Prize in 1953, Gold Medals at the Milan Triennale in 1951, 1954 and 1957 and the International Design Award of the American Institute of Interior Designers in 1963.

Find jewelry by Henning Koppel on nordlingsjewelry.com.

Literature: The Lunning Prize, Nationalmusei utställningskatalog nr 489, 1986

Birger Kaipiainen (1915-1988)

Birger Kaipiainen was Finland’s foremost ceramic artist of the midcentury period, whose unique style gave him world renown. His unique works are acclaimed collector’s pieces and his tableware designs from the 1960s are still in production.

Kaipiainen showed exceptional talent already as a student at the University of Art and Design in Helsinki. Following his studies, he joined Arabia’s art department at twenty-two, and was given complete freedom to develop his artistry. He has been described as “quiet and dreaming”, and his personality is certainly expressed in his imaginative, etheral creations. He had suffered from polio at a young age, and its effects prevented him from making thrown work. This was something that likely led him find his own expression, which stands in contrast to the often stark creations of his contemporaries like Toini Muona and Rut Bryk. During the 1940s he worked with large plaques with flowing edges and romantic themes inspired by the medieval, Rococo and Renaissance periods. In the 1950s he created stylized birds and human figures, while later in the 1960s developing large series of unique plates with striking ornaments in a lush Baroque style. He had a profound knowledge of ceramic techniques as well as of glazes and used careful techniques to maintain the innate glow of pigments as they made their way through the kiln.

Birger Kaipianen worked at Arabia during his entire career, from 1937 to 1988, with a four year stint at Rörstrand between 1954 and 1958. Among his numerous awards are Dimplôme d’Honneur in Milan in 1951, Grand Prix in Milan in 1960, the Pro Finlandia award in 1963 and Prins Eugen medal in 1982.

Litterature: ”Ceramic Art in Finland, A Contemporary Tradition”, Edited by Åsa Hellman, Otava Publishing Company Ltd, Finland, 2004

Karl Gustav Hansen (1914-2002)

Karl Gustav Hansen was one of Denmark’s most distinguished silversmiths of the Scandinavian Modern period. He created modernist designs of superb quality that influenced the direction of modernist silver in Denmark and the rest of Scandinavia. Under his leadership, the Hans Hansen firm employed some of Denmark’s best known silversmiths, including Bent Knudsen, Allan Scharff and Bent Gabrielsen. Throughout his 60 year long career, he stayed with the traditional, hand driven way of creating hollowware, even though the industry turned to new automated techniques. He did not want to become a subordinate to the limitations of machines and always strived to grown and excel as an artisan.

Karl Gustav Hansen was son of the renowned silversmith Hans Hansen (1884-1940), who had established his silversmithy in the town of Kolding in 1920. Karl Gustav Hansen started as an apprentice in his father’s workshop in 1930, for Einar Olsen, who had been recruited from Georg Jensen the same year. His career began in an exciting time, when concrete forms had to make way for abstract ones with the emergence of functionalism. His hollowware was met with acclaim and proved commercially successful. During this early period he created the church silver for Nørre Bjert Kirke in Kolding. 

During Karl Gustav Hansen’s apprentice’s years, Hans Hansen launched the firm’s jewelry branch for the first time. Karl Gustav Hansen’s early jewelry designs broke new ground with their pure geometric forms, where strict lines were balanced with unexpected angles, turns and compositions with semi-precious stones. In 1932, Hans Hansen commissioned his son to create a new line of jewelry and Karl Gustav Hansen subsequently proposed more than 50 new designs. All were intended to be hand produced, although the father’s plan had been for the jewelry to be made by machine. The ”Future” series was born – a line of avantgarde, geometric and balanced designs that also launched Karl Gustav Hansen as a jewelry designer of major influence. 

Following his apprenticeship, Karl Gustav Hansen studied for Einar Utzon-Frank at Kunstakademiets Billedhuggerskole from 1935 to 1938. Simultaneously, he worked in the Hans Hansen workshop, which had then moved to Copenhagen. Hans Hansen died unexpectedly in 1940 and Karl Gustav had to take on the role as CEO and creative leader at an early age. It was a rough start in a difficult time of war and German occupation, but the company made it through. After the war, the business grew under Karl Gustav Hansen’s leadership. He also served as guest professor at the University of Indiana in 1959, while simultaneously opening more shops, some in collaboration with Anton Michelsen. 

In 1953, Bent Gabrielsen was recruited just out of Guldsmedehøjskolen (The Goldsmith’s College), where Karl Gustav Hansen was one of the examiners. He became lead designer for the jewelry line, and eventually executive manager, remaining at Hans Hansen until 1969. While Bent Gabrielsen was at the firm, Karl Gustav Hansen almost did not design any jewelry, but returned to this area after 1969. The jewelry from the late 1960s and 1970s is expressive, geometric and sculptural, as well as functionally excellently made and easy to wear. 

Through turbulent years and collaborations with sculptors such as Henry Moore and Lynn Chadwick in the 1970s, Karl Gustav Hansen remained as CEO and designer at Hans Hansen until 1987. Hans Hansen eventually merged with Georg Jensen in 1992.

Karl Gustav Hansen participated at the World Exhibitions in Brussels 1935, Paris in 1937, New York in 1939 and 1964, among other exhibitions. He is represented at Kunstindustrimuseum in Copenhagen, Nationalmuseum in Stockholm, The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and Victoria & Albert Museum in London, among others. 

Find jewelry from Hans Hansen on nordlingsjewelry.com.

Literature: Karl Gustav Hansen. Sølv/Silber 1930–1994. Poul Dedenroth-Schou. © Museet på Koldinghus, Kolding, 1994

Olle Ohlsson (1928-)

Olle Ohlsson is a Swedish silversmith with a unique artistic expression that pushes limits. Trained as an artisan before studying to become an artist, he developed his own style at an early stage and was less influenced by the aesthetic ideals of the time. His work includes jewelry, corpus, sculpture and imaginative utilitarian items, such as bejeweled gold handles for canes. 

Olle Ohlsson was born in Stockholm and grew up with his parents and sister in a creative home. His father was a musician and an innovative stay-at-home father. His mother, who was the family bread winner, was a cutter. She had been an artist’s model as a young woman and had been model to Carl Milles during the creation of the ”Orfeus” sculpture in Stockholm. The unconventional way of life had a big part in shaping Ohlsson into an artist who formed his own path.  

He worked as an apprentice at C. G. Hallberg jewelers firm from 1944 to 1949, getting a sterling craftsman’s eduction. He proceeded to work for other firms including Atelier Borgila, Erik Fleming, W. A. Bohlin and Claës Giertta. Working for Giertta was particularly influential, since freedom in creativity was boosted there. He also began taking evening classes at Konstfack, which marked the start of his transition from artisan to artist. As a way of liberating his creativity, Olle Ohlsson started drawing in an abstract, seeking way that is reminiscent of cave paintings. This suggestive way of drawing can be seen rendered in the decor of many of his creations. 

Olle Ohlsson started work as a designer at Ge-Kå jewelry firm in 1960. In his free time he experimented with silver, heating it up and making it shrink. He balanced on the edge of being a designer and an artist, which was met with some confusion from critics who expected to be able to place creators in one of the categories. However, at his debut in NK in 1965 he was applauded as being a brilliant renewer of his trade. He went on to work with silver and gold in unconventional ways, including precious stones as well as natural ones into his designs. Among his works are a set of gold cases, made from gold donated by the camera maker Victor Hasselblad, a golden anthill, silver teapots and hat sculptures. He has also created several public works, such as doors, wall reliefs, gates and prizes, including a gold potato for the Nobel Prize winner Isaac Bashevis Singer. He is represented at, among others, Nationalmuseum in Stockholm, Goldsmiths’ Hall in London and Oslo Museum.

Literature: Silver & Guld. Olle Ohlsson. Gunnar Brusewitz & Anne-Marie Ericsson. Förlags AB Wiken, 1991

Berndt Friberg (1899-1981)

Berndt Friberg was a Swedish ceramicist, renowned for his stoneware vases and vessels for Gustavsberg. His pure, composed designs with satiny, compelling glazes continue to fascinate and have given him a dedicated following of collectors all over the world. He was the designer, master thrower as well as glaze maker, a rare combination.

Friberg came from a long family line of potters. He started as a handyman at Höganäs at the age of 13, leaving the factory five years later as a certified thrower. At Höganäs, he had worked with the serial production of the company’s trademark jugs, throwing a hundred or more of them every day during the years that he worked there. The craftsmanship, standard of quality and work ethic that he learned at Höganäs was the base for his development into one of the world’s foremost throwers. In his youth, he also went to technical school and studied drawing and modeling, however he did not partake in any art studies. Neither did he move in artistic circles, but seeing an exhibition of Gunnar Nylund’s stoneware in Helsingborg in the early 1930s made a deep impact. 

Before his employment at Gustavsberg in 1934, Friberg worked for other ceramics’ companies in Sweden and Denmark that broadened his experience. However getting the job as Wilhelm Kåge’s thrower at Gustavsberg was a major turning point in his career. Working with Kåge and subsequently Stig Lindberg brought new dimensions to Friberg’s work and life, moving away from the creation of utilitarian items to the aesthetic. He was revered by Kåge for his craftsmanship. During his first years at Gustavsberg he also developed his work with glazes. In 1941 he had is first exhibition in Stockholm, an event that marked his transition into an artist. 

Through Wilhelm Kåge, Berndt Friberg got in touch with a circle of ceramicists, connoisseurs, collectors and museum workers that influenced his artistic development. Chinese ceramics from the Sung period and the contemporary Nordic stoneware were held in particularly high regard. Friberg’s work came to be seen as the embodiment of the pure, balanced core of Nordic design. 

During his life long career, Friberg became deeply appreciated both by the broad public as well as connoisseurs and critics. The Swedish king Gustav VI Adolf was a major collector of his work and many of Friberg’s best pieces are part of the royal collection. He was awarded a gold medal at the Milano Triennale in 1947, 1951 and 1954 and won first prize at the Faenza International Ceramic Exhibition in 1965. He had 19 separate exhibitions and is represented at, among others,  Nationalmuseum in Stockholm, Det Danske Kunstindustrimuseum in Copenhagen, Victoria and Albert Museum in London, MoMa in New York and the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences in Sydney. 

Find pieces by Berndt Friberg here.

Literature: Berndt Friberg, Stengods Gustavsberg. Arthur Hald & Marianne Landqvist. Keramiskt Centrum, AB Gustavsberg, 1979

Erik Höglund (1932-1998)

Erik Höglund was one of Sweden’s foremost glass artists, whose innovative designs and glass making techniques revolutionized the scene of both art glass and serve ware in the 1950s. His bold and personal designs gave him and the glassworks Boda worldwide acclaim. Erik Höglund is considered the most influential Swedish glass artist of the 1950s and 1960s, alongside Ingeborg Lundin.

Höglund was admitted to the prestigious school Konstfack at the age of 16, first studying to become an art teacher, but later changing to the sculptor’s line. He rebelled against many of what he considered to be conventional ideas at the school, and was almost expelled. His nonconformism would follow him through his career, aiding him in following his own path and repeatedly breaking new ground.

Erik Höglund started working at Boda glassworks in 1953. At the time, Boda focused on producing high-quality serve ware in ethereal, cut-glass designs under the direction of Fritz Kallenberg. Höglund brought new perspectives and ideas, experimenting with the glass mass to give it a bubbly look and introducing colored glass and irregular finishes. These ideas were in direct opposition to the traditional ideas of what quality glass is, and Höglund was initially met with skepticism. He created rustic designs that allowed for everyday, multiple uses of glass, allowing it to be both functional and aesthetic. This down-to-earth idea appealed to both critics and collectors, although it took some years into the 1950s to win over the general public. In 1955, Erik Höglund’s glass was presented at the H55 Exhibition and one of his vases, whilst considered scandalous due to its suggestive decor, was purchased by the Swedish king. In 1957 he was awarded the Lunning Prize, its until then youngest awardee. Following that, his glass was exhibited in the Georg Jensen store on 5th Avenue in New York, making Erik Höglund and Boda world renowned.

Erik Höglund was a master of all artistic trades. His glass murals were an important part of his artistic deed, leading to many assignments of public decorations, around Sweden in churches, schools, banks and other public places, as well as in the United States and Australia. In the early 1960s he also started working with wrought iron, making chandeliers and candelabras, combined with glass or unadorned, that became hugely popular. Boda opened its own smithy, Boda Smide, to satisfy the demand. Höglund also worked with wood, creating rustic and playful children’s furniture, candle holders and beds.

Höglund left Boda in 1973 and worked with public assignments, often in collaboration with architects and his wife Ingrid Höglund. He continued to work with glass throughout the years for Pukeberg, Lindshammar and Strömbergshyttan glass works. He was was an incredibly productive artist, creating 150 public works from 1956 into the 1990s. Life cycles, sports and acrobatics, everyday life and family relationships were recurring sources of inspiration. Among his most notable work is the decoration of Johannelund Church in Linköping, which consisted of murals, glass sections, furnishing and the church silver. His work is represented by a permanent exhibition at Blekinge Länsmuseum and, among others, at Nationalmuseum in Stockholm, Röhsska museet in Gothenburg, Bellerive Kunstgewerbemuseum in Zürich and Cooper-Hewitt Design Museum in New York.

Find items by Erik Höglund here.

Literature: Från Boda till New York, konstnären Erik Höglund. Gunnel Holmér. Carlssons Bokförlag, 1986