2012 German Contemporary Metal Crafts Exhibition of New Taipei City

Artist list

Elisabeth Treskow, Ebbe Weiß-Weingart, Friedrich Becker, Klaus Ullrich, Reinhold Reiling, Claus Bury, Hermann Jünger, Georg Dobler, Gisela Seibert-Philippen, Jens-Rüdiger Lorenzen, Wilhelm Tasso Mattar, Gerd Rothmann, Otto Künzli, Daniel Kruger, Manfred Bischoff, Karl Fritsch, Wolfgang Lieglein, Sam Tho Duong, Tamara Grüner, Dorothea Prühl, Miriam Hiller, Iris Bodemer, Winfried Krüger

The grand opening of the 2012 German Contemporary Metal Crafts Exhibition of New Taipei City, jointly organized by Gold Museum of New Taipei City and Germany’s Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim, took place at the Gold Museum on June 29. This metalcraft feast, custom designed for audiences in Taiwan, is highly anticipated.

After starting exchange with the internationally renowned Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim in 2010, this year the Gold Museum has gone a step further and organized the 2012 German Contemporary Metal Crafts Exhibition of New Taipei City with the Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim. Planned by curator Ruan Wen-meng and Ms. Cornelie Holzach, the exhibition features precious contemporary metalcraft pieces from the Schmuckmuseum collection as well as the creative achievements of the German metalcraft education system. This exhibition will feature almost 500 pieces and is the Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim’s first exhibition in Taiwan.

Through a complete display of German metalcraft works the public will be able to understand the course of development of contemporary German metalcraft. The exhibition will have three areas displaying contemporary works from the collection of the Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim, and works by the students and staff of two schools, Fachhochschule f’r die Gestaltung Hochschule Pforzheim and Goldschmiede mit Uhrmacherschule Pforzheim, respectively, and will be sure to expand the public’s knowledge of contemporary metalcraft in Germany. 


The Schmuckmuseum is situated in Germany’s famous jewelry and gold city of Pforzheim and has a jewelry and metalcraft work collection and level of expertise that is unrivalled in the world. This exhibition will feature important works of art from the 1960s on that influenced the development of world metalcrafts and metalcraft education, such as Ebbe Weiss-Weingart's works made using electroforming, the technique giving the surface works a rough texture very different to the smooth and shiny effect usually associated with metal; this technique is still being used and innovated by metalcraft artists to this day. Works by artists who made a major contribution to metal crafts education in Europe in the 1970s, such as the pioneer of moving jewelry, Friedrich Becker, are also featured. His theme is the endless extendibility of movement, bringing physical mechanical movement into artistic creativity, creating enchanting and diverse visual effects and providing limitless inspiration to modern jewelry makers. Works by George Dobler,Otto Künzli and Gijs Bakker etc from the 1980s will also help audiences in Taiwan understand the development of contemporary metalcraft creative concepts.

As well as the fine pieces from the contemporary collection of the Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim, works by the students and staff of the Fachhochschule f’r die Gestaltung Hochschule Pforzheim and Goldschmiede mit Uhrmacherschule Pforzheim are also featured and should not be underestimated. The Fachhochschule f’r die Gestaltung Hochschule Pforzheim is the highest metalcraft educational institution in Germany and has been rated in the top 60 design schools in the world, alongside Harvard, Stanford and MIT. The works by students and staff in this exhibition display a solid aesthetic foundation and the creative ingenuity of European youth. For its part, established for more than 230 years, the Goldschmiede mit Uhrmacherschule Pforzheim is a vocational school that specializes in gold jewelry carving, and jewel and watch design; teaching emphasizes advancement of technique and increasing the creative ability of students. The works from the two schools will give audiences in Taiwan a chance to observe the level of metalcraft education in Germany and the exhibition will present a good opportunity for observing and exchange for metalcraft educational circles in Taiwan.

As well as displaying fine contemporary German metalcraft works, the exhibition will also feature the results of specialized metalcraft training in different countries, allowing metalcraft creative workers and teachers in Taiwan to acquire an understanding of different metalcraft training systems and also, at the same time, through lectures and an catalogue, aims to give metalcraft creative workers in Taiwan an opportunity to interact with German metalcraft experts, leading to more attention being given to the development of metalcraft in Taiwan. Everyone is welcome to visit this exhibition and take part in the associated lectures and activities, together appreciating the beauty of contemporary German metalcraft.

Ruan Weng-Mong
National Curator of 2012 German Contemporary Metal Crafts, New Taipei City

Thanks to his decades of time living and travelling around the world, Ruan Weng-Mong is now an artist with great life experience. In Taiwan, he learnt academic style of sculpture. Then, he spent many years in his youth in Africa and Europe. The life in Swaziland opened a window to the world for him and he established a firm foundation in metal work in jewellery making in Germany. Ruan is currently devoted himself in creating metal crafts and passing on the skills. Meanwhile, he vigorously participates in the promotion of metal crafts in Taiwan, as well as the communications between domestic and international metalsmith artists.

Cornelie Holzach
Director of the Pforzheim’s Jewellery Museum
International curator of 2012 German Contemporary Metal Crafts, New Taipei City

Born in Ruetlingen, Germany, in 1959. Cornelie Holzach used to be the researcher of the “Design Database” project for the University of Applied Arts in Pforzheim and Universität für angewandte Kunst Wien in Vienna. In 1997, she started to work at the jewellery museum in Pforzheim. She has been the director of the Pforzheim’s Jewellery Museum since 2005.