6 July 2021

Product design in the former GDR (German Democratic Republic): MKG Hamburg exhibits the work of designer and teacher Christa Petroff-Bohne

Female designers from former East Germany (GDR, 1949 - 1990) are rarely celebrated like male colleagues from the West. The exhibition 'Beauty of Form. The Designer Christa Petroff-Bohne' closes now this historical gap in the cultural consciousness about the achievements of designers of the former GDR (or in German, the DDR) during the 1950ies, 60ies when design was brought into people's everyday life. The exhibition was developed by the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden and the MKG Hamburg and was shown already last year at the SKD location Kunstgewerbemuseum at Schloss Pillnitz in a setting of modular constructed elements by Katleen Arthen referencing esthetics of post-war modernism. From 9 July until 24 October 2021, 'Beauty of Form' about Christa Petroff-Bohne, her work as designer and teacher (Professor at the Weißensee Academy of Art Berlin) and the life of designers in the DDR, will be on show at the MKG Hamburg.

Image: The insight into the exhibition at the Kunstgewerbemuseum at Schloss Pillnitz (27 June - 1 November 2020) shows a pyramid made of ice cream cups. The ice cream cup (stainless steel) was created 1960 by Christa Petroff-Bohne (born 1934) and manufactured by VEB Auer Besteck- und Silber­warenwerke. © Photo: SKD/Klemens Renner.