HAWK, University of Applied Science and Arts in Hildesheim Department Metal Design

The creative basis for this is a comprehensive understanding of the meaning, context, and relation of materials and shapes in order to reflect the idea, the narration, the function, or the application. Aesthetic, cultural, and physical aspects are addressed and used in analogue and digital transformations and techniques.
Central intentions for the artistic researches and design processes are our constantly changing environment, current cultural and social affairs, and the individual encounters in those contexts. The evoking questions are reflected together within the dialogues between the students and teachers.
These approaches stand in direct contact with a self-developed concept or motif and involve in-depth research in practice in order to build up a significant artistic position. The ambition of the studies is to learn to contextualize one's own position to understand it in the larger context and to be able to make it visible to the recipient or user through the realization-materialization. The documentation of these processes as well as the presentation are part of this aesthetic practice.
 
Therefore, the aim of our courses is to accompany and encourage the students to find their own form of expression in the process and develop a sense of authenticity.
The artistic forms of expression are free, and the possibilities are very diverse.
A vessel, a piece of furniture, a piece of jewelry, or an object related to the body or space can represent an artistic position. Thus, the results find themselves between use-oriented, applied, or free artistic representations.
 
Our students bring different levels of prior knowledge of manufacturing techniques and an understanding of materials. In our workshops (goldsmith-, silversmith- and blacksmith workshop) the students receive individual offers of techniques and use them creatively, innovatively and professionally.
 
The studies in the Metal design department range between the diverse dimensions and the interaction of space, body and material:
> Jewelry and body-related objects
> Vessels and objects in relation to table culture
> Architecture and space-related works

Teachers:
Prof. Hartwig Gerbracht  (Architecture and space-related works and objects in relation to the table).
Prof. Melanie Isverding  (Jewelry and body-related objects).
Dipl.-Des. Ellen Ropeter (Goldsmith workshop, enamel workshop, casting workshop).
Dipl.-Des. Cord Theinert (Silversmith workshop, blacksmith workshop).
Dipl.-Des. Sham Patwardhan-Joshi (Dozent Jewelry and body-related objects).


> Jewelry and body-related objects
Close to the human body – Jewelry as Symbols from time, thoughts, and imprints
The need to wear jewelry is part of human activity. Worn by a person, the object associates ideas, thoughts, values, and attitudes. Jewelry is an individual medium of expression and is able to carry identities and narratives to emphasize messages.
The design of jewelry can be based on social and cultural observations, allowing personal perceptions to be shared and leading to a material interpretation. This embodiment transcends the material itself, creating meaning and containing significant symbolic power in a sensual non-verbal language.
In the making process, the hand-head-heart relationship is decisive in order to let the interactions in the artistic process flow into a corresponding significant realization and to create authorship and originality.

> Vessels and objects in relation to table culture
Individual responses to global food cultures
How would we like to design our meals in the future? What is a well-designed eating object?
We explore these and other questions in this approach to objects and vessels in relation to table culture.
The possibilities are as diverse as our global food cultures. The needs as diverse as the situations in which people meet and cultivate their food intake.
Classic thematic fields such as cups, jugs, cutlery, drinking, and portioning, but also sacred devices and vessels provide an occasion for individual responses of our time. The tasks can be designed as unique pieces or as prototypes for serial production.
The goal is for our students to develop their individual, artistic expressiveness and to be able to implement their contemporary or even visionary designs professionally and independently.
Interdisciplinary projects with our HAWK porcelain workshop or glass and porcelain manufactories expand this field of activity.
 
> Architecture and space-related works
See and feel rooms
Do we need a new understanding of space? The origin of architecture is practical to use. It is, therefore, necessary to keep reflecting on how social requirements, but also new technologies and materials are changing architecture and architectural details.
Learning to see and feel the space, the place, and the materials as well, as learning to recognize the aesthetic and physical potential to develop your own way of expression: This is the way of thinking and working with which we support our students.
In our teaching content, we also want to design the sensual, narrative level, beyond the fulfillment of the various functional criteria and the consideration of constructive and economic aspects. This applies to the design of a gate, a piece of furniture, or a free sculpture.
Understanding is often only possible when doing. That is why experimental and task-related material and work experiences are very important to us in the workshops. We closely link them to methodological teaching. It is our aim that you expand your skills, ideally, you can implement your designs professionally and independently.
 
An interdisciplinary exchange between the teaching areas of the faculty as well as across faculties and universities is supported.
Building on the six-semester bachelor's course, we promote the further development of individual creative skills in the four-semester master's course to expand the understanding and relation between practice and theory.
 
At the HAWK University of Applied Science and Arts Hildesheim, you chose one main department from the nine fields of competencies and at the same time gain interdisciplinary knowledge and experience from courses in the other fields of competence: Advertising Design, Branding Design, Digital Environments, Colour Design, Graphic Design, Interior Architecture, Metal Design, Lighting Design, and Product Design.