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Phone: (785) 227-2217
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Raymer Society Consignment Art Auction
Lot 31:
Paul Soltner (1921-2011) stoneware, cup, artist’s stamp on foot, good condition, no chips or cracks. Soldner was born in Summerfield, Illinois on April 24, 1921. Growing up, he had never planned to be an artist; in fact, as a college student, he was pre-med. His medical aspirations waned after being drafted into the Army and serving as a medic for three-and-a-half years during World War II. He returned to the United States with a strong interest in photography, and the desire to pursue a more artistic career. He turned to painting, and earned a bachelor’s degree in art at Bluffton College in Ohio, and then a master’s from the University of Colorado in Boulder.At Boulder, Katie Horseman, a visiting lecturer and head of ceramics at Edinburgh College of Art in Scotland, introduced Soldner to ceramics. After teaching for eight years in public schools and driven to become a potter, Soldner, then 33, headed for Los Angeles County Art Institute, became Voulkos’ first student, earned his master’s in fine arts, and began what art historians look upon as a seminal journey toward contemporary ceramic sculpture.Under Voulkos, Soldner helped set up the ceramics department with equipment and invented modifications to the pottery wheel, which began a lifelong interest in innovations — Soldner Pottery Equipment. The artist was one of Voulkos’ few students who continued to make functional ceramics at the institute, observes Garth Clark in A Century of Ceramics in the United States, 1878-1978. Though he worked in a traditional form, his exploratory nature was involved in creating his monumental "floor pots, " which stood up to nine feet in height, often with expressionistically painted areas on the forms.In 1956, after graduation, Soldner was asked to stand in for the ceramics instructor at Scripps College in Claremont, California. He stayed and taught at Scripps and the Claremont Graduate School for 37 years — and remained prolific during his teaching years (he has had 178 solo exhibitions, 400 invitational exhibitions, and given more than 400 lectures, seminars, demonstrations, and workshops. He also created and has curated the annual Scripps Ceramics Invitational exhibition. Meanwhile, his students included a ‘Who’s Who’ of contemporary ceramic sculptors, including Jun Kaneko and Rudy Autio.Soldner has made invaluable contributions to the field of ceramics, including developing American raku and a technique known as "low-temperature salt firing." His involvement with raku, for which he has gained international acclaim, came by chance. As Garth Clark relates:"Invited to demonstrate at a crafts fair in 1960, Soldner decided to experiment with the technique. Using Bernard Leach’s A Potter’s Book as his guide, he set up a simple kiln and improvised a few lead-based glazes. The results were disappointing: the clay body did not respond well to the quick firing technique, and the glazes were shiny and too brightly colored. His fascination with raku (a Japanese technique developed in the sixteenth century) did not diminish, however, and Soldner continued to experiment. At first he produced mainly tea bowls, but soon found these restrictive and somewhat academic, as there was no tea ceremony in Western culture that would give the forms their traditional significance. He gradually discovered he was more interested in raku as a technique and an aesthetic than as a tradition. This attitude resulted in a much more playful approach to form, scale, function, and material."As his main medium of expression, Soldner adopted, transformed, and manipulated traditional raku — which involves throwing and bisque-firing vessels which are then glazed and placed directly in an open raku kiln to be withdrawn a few minutes later and plunged into water — and gained widespread acclaim in the ceramics art world. Though through Soldner, raku has evolved from its Oriental traditions and become a strongly American art form — one that requires the same depth and sensitivity to succeed. Soldner states (1973):In the spirit of raku, there is the necessity to embrace the element of surprise. There can be no fear of losing what was once planned and there must be an urge to grow along with the discovery of the unknown. In the spirit of raku: make no demands, expect nothing, follow no absolute plan, be secure in change, learn to accept another solution and, finally, prefer to gamble on your own intuition. Raku offers us deep understanding of those qualities in pottery which are of a more spiritual nature, of pots by men willing to create objects that have meaning as well as function.Soldner has long infused new issues and ideas into his work. His development of the low-temperature salt firing method for his raku pieces and his pedestal pieces — thrown and altered sculptural clay forms — push the limits of clay, revealing unique textures and forms. Soldner’s works have been exhibited in throughout all of the major cities of Europe and the United States, Canada, Latvia, Japan, Taiwan, Korea, and Australia.Soldner is also the author of numerous articles and a book. Kilns and Their Construction, and the founder of the Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Snowmass Village, Colorado. The center was founded in 1968, and Soldner served as the director in the early 1970s. It is now well known for its excellent summer program, drawing people from all over the world to study with well-known teachers.
Condition: good condition, no chips or cracks
Dimensions: 4.5 x 4.5 in
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Red Barn Studio Museum
212 S. Main Street, Lindsborg, Ks 67456
Phone: (785) 227-2217
email: raymer@redbarnstudio.org
© 2023 redbarnstudio.org