GOLDSCHEIDER

Description

Goldscheider, a Viennese factory (est. 1885), soon sped to the top of European ceramics makers. Figures and vessels of faience and terracotta as well as bronze and alabaster, all of top quality in respect of form and workmanship, were created in the Historicist, Jugendstil and Art Déco period styles. A crucial factor was collaboration with distinguished sculptors and ceramicists of the day – including Demetre Chiparus, Walter Bosse and Josef Lorenzl – who were responsible for a great many of the Goldscheider designs.

This success story was quashed by National Socialist aryanisation in 1938: the Goldscheider family was forced to emigrate from Vienna, the firm was sold and the new proprietor was unable to sustain the high aesthetic quality standard. The Goldscheider brothers did manage to open new ceramics businesses while in exile in the US and England and Walter Goldscheider even returned to Vienna after the Second World War to resume his post as managing director of his old firm; however, in the 1950s the great ceramics tradition of this venerable Viennese business ended when it was sold to the German Carstens company.

Although a huge clientele of Goldscheider ceramics collectors exists worldwide, there have been virtually no publications dealing with this important field for collectors. Now a catalogue of works with information on more than 4,000 models (including over 1,600 reproductions of models) and an extensive history of the company (with over 400 colour illustrations) is available. Further, our publication provides an exhaustive index of artists as well as a complete overview of marks.

For more information and appraisals visit
www.goldscheider.de

“Glamour Girls for the Middle Class”, Wendy Moonan, The New York Times, 12.2.2009