Glassworks on display
Anne Ehrner and Kosta Boda enjoy a great and long-running relationship. «Crystal Waves,» an exhibition featuring Ehrner’s glassworks for the Swedish company, opened at the Illum Design Center last week. It is organized by Agelco, Kosta Boda’s distributor in Greece and follows last year’s showcasing of yet another Kosta Boda artist, Kjell Engman. Born in Stockholm in 1948, Ehrner attended the Konstfack college of art and design before joining Kosta Boda in 1974. The Swedish company – a glassmaking specialist since 1742 – maintains a number of collaborations with leading Scandinavian artists who in turn enjoy experimenting and coming up with unique, signature collections. At the Kosta Boda laboratories, Ehrner is prone to experimentation, in a continuous effort to bring together the practical with the beautiful. For years, the artist was known for the use of black in her designs, yet by the 1990s, she had begun to add more color. At the same time she started incorporating veils of color inside the crystal and developed leaf-like pieces. «Our life blood is the creative process which takes place in the blowing room; this is where glass is conceived, where it is fashioned and comes alive,» notes Ehrner. «For me the aim is to freeze a moment in time, to capture an expression and give it artistic form. Or, put simply, to transform hot into cold.» The artist has earned two Excellent Swedish Design awards and her work often goes on display at a variety of galleries and museums, including Sweden’s National Museum of Fine Arts and the Musee des Arts Decoratifs in Paris. Illum Design Center, 194 Kifissias, Halandri. To May 6. Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.; Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
