6/22/06 Contact: Scott Bishop-Wagoner, 334/844-7014 (bishogs@auburn.edu)
Teresa Whitman-McCall, 334/844-7521 (whitmtl@auburn.edu)

WORKS OF PREMIER INDUSTRIAL DESIGNER EVA ZIESEL AT AU’S JULE COLLINS SMITH MUSEUM OF FINE ART

AUBURN - A retrospective exhibition of one of the 20th century’s most influential industrial designers is at the Jule Collins Smith Museum at Auburn University through Sept. 2.

“Eva Zeisel: The Playful Search for Beauty” examines Zeisel’s influence on ceramic ware, with over 100 pieces on display demonstrating the fluid lines, sensuous forms and organic simplicity of the modern aesthetic in decorative arts.

At almost 100, Zeisel is one of the most important and well-known designers in the U.S. The “Playful Search for Beauty” exhibit is the first to include Zeisel’s contribution to industrial design in the former Soviet Union, which would later determine her contribution to modern design in the United States.

Born Eva Amalia Stricker in 1906, the artist grew up in Budapest and Vienna. Driven from central Europe by xenophobia and unemployment, Zeisel took her innovative ideas to the Soviet Union where she transformed the concept of modern design from what she describes as “cold and negative” into something warm and familiar.

In 1937, Zeisel fled from the Nazis to Vienna and then to England. She emigrated to the U. S. a year later and began designing wares for companies such as Hall China Company and Red Wing Pottery. Her rapidly progressing career included commissions by the Museum of Modern Art and Castleton China to design the first modern porcelain dinnerware for the United States, a project that later became the subject of the one-woman show at the Museum of Modern Art.

Zeisel describes her career and her designs as the product of a “playful search for beauty.” The elements of good design, good business sense and forward thinking that characterize her work are reappearing in contemporary mass-produced products for the home from corporate icons such as Target, Ikea and Apple Computer.

“Eva Zeisel: The Playful Search for Beauty” is organized by the Knoxville Museum of Fine Art and curated by Karen Kettering, curator for Russian and Eastern European Art, Hillwood Museum & Gardens.

The Jule Collins Smith Museum at Auburn University is located at 901 S. College Street in Auburn. Museum hours are: Tues. - Sat. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information, click on http://jcsm.auburn.edu/.

Auburn University is a preeminent land-grant and comprehensive research institution with more than 23,000 students and 6,500 faculty and staff. Ranked among the top 50 public universities nationally, Auburn is Alabama’s largest educational institution, offering more than 230 undergraduate, graduate and doctoral degree programs.

(Contributed by Scott Bishop-Wagoner.)

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