The motto of Chemnitz's co-tenure as European Cultural Capital 2025 is C_The_Unseen: on the one hand a motto than can be read as C(hemnitz)_The_Unseen, an attempt at freeing Chemnitz, and environs, from the relative anonymity it has fallen into, not least on account of its DDR biography, and to bring it once more alongside a Leipzig and Dresden with whom it over generations stood at eye level; on the other can be read as an admonishment to view familiar things differently, to question that which you see rather than blithely accepting it as definitive and thereby not seeing it, allowing it to progress hidden before your eyes.
And on the rare third hand, can be read as a very literal invitation to peak behind velvet curtains that are normally closed to the uninitiated.
The latter a reading embraced by the students of the Faculty Angewandte Kunst Schneeberg who with the showcase Schneeberger Geflecht in the Kunstsammlungen, Chemnitz, invite us all into their otherwise unseen world.......
Located a little to the south-west of Chemnitz in the Erzgebirge cordillera, and tracing its (hi)story back to 1878 and the establishment of the Königlichen Spitzenklöppelmusterschule Schneeberg, Royal Lace-making School Schneeberg, an institution very much rooted in the region's long (hi)story in textiles of all genres, the contemporary Faculty Angewandte Kunst Schneeberg is part of the Westsächsische Hochschule Zwickau and offers courses of study in Musical Instrument Making, another long practised discipline in the region, and Design, with specialisations in Wood Design, Clothing Design and in Textile Art/Textile Design whose derivation as a creative process from the technical process of lace-making once taught in Schneeberg helps reinforce not only the institute's development over the past 150ish years but also the separation between the processes of shaping and of making that the rise of design and industrialisation has brought to bear on once artisan practices of all hues since the end of the 19th century.
Genres, disciplines, represented in Schneeberger Geflecht - Schneeberg Mesh, Network, Braid, Web - in a presentation whose first room mirrors when not the actual workshops and atelier spaces in Schneeberg then certainly a generalised impression of what (near) any art and design school's workshops and ateliers look like: occupied as it is not only with machines, tools, and stained and marked and glued workbenches, but also with projects in various stages of development from students past and present, both named, including, for example, and amongst others, Leonie Jacobi's 2024 Bachelor project, Experimental Screen Printing, Magdalena Helaß's 2024 Master's clothing collection Bold Move or Karl Clauss Dietel and Lutz Rudolph's 1998 Swingline projects for Chemnitz based IT concern SIGMA, essentially multi-functional/medial communication objects from an age before multi-functional/medial communication objects, and less a Schneeberg project per se as a reminder of Dietel's close association with the school, including his tenure as Rector between 1986 and 1990. And by projects by Schneeberger unnamed, including works from the semester projects Artistic and Creative Fundamentals, that Schneeberg interpretation of the (oft) conceptual orientated foundation course that has been a mainstay of creative eduction since the earliest years of the 20th century, or Interpretation of the "Titan" Violin by Antonio Stradivari, a project that, as one learns, is an annual first semester course for Music Instrument Making students that, as the title neatly implies, asks students to interpret Stradivari's 1715 Titan violin. To, as one learns, freely interpret the violin as a virtuoso on that violin might interpret the written music in front of them.
A presentation in a space in the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz that, when we were last in it, housed the exhibition Reform of Life & Henry van de Velde mittendrin, a portrait of, as Reform of Life neatly underscored, a pioneer and leading protagonist of the shift of creative eduction away from the copying of works past, works extant, it had learned from fine art education, and that invariably was the basis of instruction at the Königlichen Spitzenklöppelmusterschule Schneeberg, towards a focus on encouraging and advancing the creativity of the individual student, a process in which the workshop principle as the basis for creative eduction was very important. A workshop principle in creative education championed and advanced by van de Velde, not least during his years in Weimar, that is today still widely practised.
From the general introduction to the institution and its approaches, Schneeberger Geflecht moves on first to a discussion on What Moves Us?, that question, that invariably unseen question, of why you do it, that is also an invitation for others to question if you should be doing it, or if it wouldn't be better for all if you did something else. See, for example, the final chapter of Nike: Form Follows Motion at the Vitra Design Museum, Weil am Rhein, and its misuse, abuse, of culture to sell trainers. Or see... no we'll leave that, them, for another day.
The answers from the Schneeberger being presented in the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz as Protest, Regional, Everyday Life, Memory and Origins, Nature, and Transparency, the latter including, amongst other works, Beatrice Müller's Schneeberger Spitze from 1994, a lace crafted from metal wire that is not only transparent but also a component of the conceptual shifts design has enabled, empowered, creative practice to make since lace-making was first taught in the Schneeberg institute in 1878, and by an undated juicer by Maik Ihle that not only features a transparent mechanism so that you can view the juice being pressed, but that in its deliciously inordinate scale, it's size far beyond that which is necessary for the art of extracting juice from a fruit or vegetable, and its analogousness, its need for human power to extract the juice, also offers a transparent honesty rarely admitted to on our contemporary unhealthy relationship with household electric goods of all types, of the unsustainably of our contemporary homes; of the need to rethink not just domestic management and domestic chores, but domesticity.
And subsequently the chapter Engaging in Dialogue with Each Other, which, as the title implies, concerns itself with design as, when not necessarily a collective practice, then certainly as a conversive, a collaborative, practice, one that invariably is advanced by discourse and the input of alternative perspectives. And a space that in contrast to the echo of the Schneeberg workshops and ateliers of the first room is (largely) the actual communal kitchen of the so-called Holzhaus in Schneeberg, invites one to enter that so central conversive, collaborative space on the Schneeberg campus.
A space in the Kunstsammlungen, as on the Schneeberg campus, occupied by the students' table football... table... and also by chairs and benches designed by Jochen Weinreiter and Dietmar Richter as a component of their joint 1980 Diploma project at Schneeberg. Objects that were conceived as furniture for the restaurant/bar Südspitze, an eponymous establishment in the, then, newly constructed, first phase of what would become the Berlin-Marzahn housing estate; a project that underscores the importance of external cooperations, of real-life cooperations, in creative education, of getting out of the bubble of the workshop, of the kitchen, of extending the dialogue beyond the student kitchen, the student universe.
And objects that for all the superficially "pallet" nature of the approach and visuals — whereby we're not entirely sure if "pallet" furniture was even a thing in 1980 or if Weinreiter and Richter proposed it — and for all the light echo of Gerrit T Rietveld's 1930s Crate furniture, are objects very much of themselves; objects that embody a neatly worked construction, an unobtrusively achived sitting comfort and security, some very nuanced reflections on the demands of producing and maintaining public space furniture, and that also very satisfyingly mediate an appreciation that permanence is invariably something flexible rather than something rigid, an appreciation that one wouldn't necessarily expect to find in 1980s Marzahn. But which 1980s Marzahn could have done with more of. Should have paid more attention to.
Thus are 1980s benches and chairs that, arguably, today's Schneeberg students can not only sit on but learn from, as the architects of Marzahn could have; can learn from engaging in a dialogue with, as much as Weinreiter and Richter, one presumes, learned from engaging in dialogue with the Karl Claus Dietel and the Hans Brockhage who supervised the project. A Hans Brockhage who, as oft noted in these dispatches, is intimately linked with the (hi)story of Schneeberg, and who who himself learned from dialogue with Chemnitz's own Marianne Brandt. That other great C(hemnitz) Unseen in the (hi)story of design.
And a focus on design arising from dialogue very much continued in the final chapter, Design Thrives on Interaction!, and its flurry of invitations on the visitors.
Including, for example, an invitation to Dress Up in creations originating from a variety of conceptual and practical Schneeberger student clothing projects; an invitation to Take a Seat in a variety of works that help elucidate that while a seat is an object for sitting on it can also be a critique on society and social relationships, a demand not just to sit but to act; an invitation to Make Music, if you can, or noise if you can't, including on a steel guitar by Ronny Zysko and an uncredited violin, that, presumably, isn't a Stradivari from 1715. And also an invitation to Play: an invitation specific in context of a collection of toys realised by Schneeberg students, and more general in the flurry of invitations of the final chapter, including those to Dream, to Provoke, to Procrastinate, to Despair, to Step Out of Your Comfort Zone, or to Remain a Work in Progress, and the manners in which one is able to accept those myriad invitations, that also extend an unspoken but very present and warmly extended invitation to rediscover the child in you. And to reflect if that might not be the better way to move through life. ¿Where has being an adult got you, gotten us all?
Invitations that not only arise from the position that design, as the title proclaims, Thrives on Interaction!, that design thrives on dialogue, that design is only meaningful, only exists, in context of the interaction between user and object; that reality Instagram is doing its best to eradicate through making design something purely visual, which it ain't. Even graphic design for all the popular focus on the visual isn't about the visual but if the visual performs its intended function, if it doesn't, it's a meaningless waste of everyone's time and resources. Or worse, an exercise in ego massaging. See, again, the final chapter of Nike: Form Follows Motion.
But invitations that, inarguably, also arise from a desire to not only explain the world of the creative student, specifically the world, physical and conceptual, tangible and intangible, of the creative student at Schneeberg, but also from a desire to empower visitors to approach the world like a creative student, or as creative students should approach the world: to see the world as a creative student sees it, should see it, with a questioning, with a criticism, with an unwillingness to accept convention, with fun, with passion, with your own singularity in a community, with a playfulness.
As noted, opined, from Resource, Research, Reset – Transformation of Sacred Spaces at DG Kunstraum Diskurs Gegenwart, Munich, there will be time aplenty once you've graduated to suppress your creativity by way of appeasing a client and ensuring you get paid. Enjoy the freedom of your studies. A freedom the rest of us can, should, must also enjoy and embrace not only because of the forces such unleashes, but primarily to remind ourselves that design isn't a product you can buy, isn't something to be consumed commercially, financially, but an approach to the world and its challenges, something to be consumed culturally, intellectually.
By way of remembering that Design, as a Lucius Burckhardt teaches us, ist Unsichtbar, is Unseen.
Similarly, for all the number and variety of objects on show, that the curators employ by way of narrating the four chapters, and for all the great delight many of those objects elicit, Schneeberger Geflecht isn't an exhibition about the objects: and that not least because as student projects they are, as ever with student projects, less about that which arose as that which the individual student got from the the process of developing the project, how the process of developing the project influenced them, where it took them, where it took their positions, etc, etc, etc, and that's not something that can be gleaned from the project alone. Is something that can only be seen in context of a long range retrospective staged in years to come.
Whereby, and that said, viewing Schneeberger Geflecht it is impossible not get drawn into extended conversations with one or the other object, and for our part we spent an inordinate amount of time with, and in addition to Jochen Weinreiter and Dietmar Richter's aforementioned benches and chairs, and with Maik Ihle's aforementioned juicer, Lars Dahlitz's 2013 Rocking Module, part of his Bachelor project and which, in essence, are readily producible wooden rockers that can be attached to any chair to safely and effortlessly transform it into a rocking chair; a transformation that has its genesis in context of reflections on furniture for the elderly but that is universal in its applicability, not least in context of enabling a variety of sitting options in the limited space of a contemporary apartments. Or of providing a framework for reflecting on the furniture of our contemporary apartments. Thus a universal applicability that is both practical and theoretical.
And also with Markus Weber's 2016 Bachelor project 2ge — Zwei & ge, Zweige, Branches — a project that we're assuming, don't know, are assuming, possibly incorrectly, but maintaining our assumption, can, at least partially, be traced back to observations of climbing woody plants and which employs a stupidly simple mechanical principle as the basis for a thoroughly impossible, but, as far as we could ascertain, stable and practical, shelving system. A system that, as one can read in Schneeberger Geflecht, both Zeitraum and Nils Holger Moormann failed to put into production.
Which apart from whatever it tells us about Zeitraum and Nils Holger Moormann, is a very neat elucidation of the difference between design and a product, of the independence of design from commerce.
However, as noted, Schneeberger Geflecht isn't about the objects.
Rather, is about the Faculty Angewandte Kunst Schneeberg as an institution defined by its staff, students, the positions of both, the interactions between such and the paths thereby initiated and travelled. On the role of the Schneeberger Geflecht - Schneeberg Mesh, Network, Braid, Web - in allowing the institute to seek to enable, to empower, its students to develop, to find their positions, to find their expressions, to find their way through the world beyond the peaks and valleys of the Erzgebirge.
A Schneeberger Geflecht that is no longer the lace it once was, but that also very much is; a Schneeberger Geflecht that helps elucidate design as inherently inter-disciplinary, as inherently interactive, as inherently the result of a process of flechten - meshing, networking, braiding, webbing - numerous, oft contradictory, strands; a Schneeberger Geflecht that extends geographically and chronologically beyond the confines of the contemporary Erzgebirge cordillera, and that is continually growing without ever losing contact with its centre. And a Schneeberger Geflecht that in being such reminds, very much as The Shakers: A World in the Making at the Vitra Design Museum, Weil am Rhein, also reminds, that the social fabric on which we all depend is a Geflecht in progress, and one for which we are all responsible.
And thus a presentation that for all it effortlessly and very entertainingly, or not depending on your skills on the guitar and/or violin, achieves its primary ambition of allowing one to C_The_Unseen behind Schneeberg's velvet curtains, and thereby to offer differentiated approaches to questions of creative eduction and what creative students actually do all day while the rest of us are working, also very pleasingly allows one, via the lens of the Faculty Angewandte Kunst Schneeberg, to C_The_Unseen of the term 'design', to recognise the oft lazy, unreflective contemporary use of the term 'design', a seeing that demands more care in our use of the term 'design'; allows one to C_The_Unseen (hi)story of Chemnitz and environs and thereby to better appreciate how that (hi)story not only informs and instructs the contemporary but the relevance of that (hi)story outwith the region; and allows one to C_The_Unseen, or perhaps more accurately to Better_C_(Parts of)_The_Unseen, in contemporary society.
Whereby, and as ever, seeing is only the first part of the process. One that we all need to become much better at.
Schneeberger Geflecht is scheduled to run at the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz, Theaterplatz 1, 09111 Chemnitz until Sunday June 29th.
Parallel you can also view Beyond Geometry. Frei Otto x Kengo Kuma which, as previously noted, features a number of items by Schneeberger past and present in its scenography.
Further information can be found at www.kunstsammlungen-chemnitz.de
Further information on the Faculty Angewandte Kunst Schneeberg can be found at www.fh-zwickau.de/aks
And further information on Chemnitz's co-tenure as European Cultural Capital 2025 and details of the associated programme of events can be found at https://chemnitz2025.de
