Gerald Weigel

Weigel spent his youth in Thuringen, Germany where, like his ancestors, he learned the craft of ceramics. He moved to Hohr Grenzhauen in 1947 and worked as a porcelain maker in a factory, and from 1954 in the workshop of Eifriede Ballzar-Kopp. In 1961, Weigel and his brother set up a joint workshop in Mainz. Until 1964, Weigel also worked at the Romanesque-Germanic National Museum as a restorer.

“Nature is the inspiration for my work stones, rock faces, and lava shapes,” he wrote. “In the 1960s, one-of-a-kind shapes were rarely found in my work. Primarily it was the shape of wings that came into existence, and which was later replaced by the shape of stones. Both became a significant part of my work.”

Weigel became a founding member of Gruppe 83, a group of leading contemporary ceramists based in Germany. His work is in the collections of the Victoria & Albert Museum, Fine Arts Museum, Taipei, and National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo.