RuvidaMente
CALABRIA
Quantitatively, ceramics is certainly the most important form of craftsmanship in Calabria and the fervor that distinguishes it allows it to cover every type, from the one of use to the artistic one.
The pieces of greatest interest, of course, are those in which the artisans best express the technical and aesthetic baggage that refers to the glories of Magna Graecia, and can be found in the workshops of Locri, Bagnara Calabra and Gerace, in the province of Reggio Calabria, in Sibari, in the province of Cosenza and Squillace, in the province of Catanzaro.
The ceramists of Seminara, in the province of Reggio Calabria, on the other hand, prefer the production of objects with symbolic shapes, linked to popular traditions, from masks to drive away bad luck to the "babbaluti", anthropomorphic bottles decorated with faces with ironic and distrustful grins.
CAMPANIA
Capodimonte porcelain is by far one of the highest forms of ceramic art. Their origin dates back to 1739, when at the behest of Charles III of Bourbon, a factory was created in Capodimonte as prestigious as it was marked by a short existence, which ended twenty years later when the king, having ascended the throne of Spain, moved to Madrid.
Twelve years later, however, with the creation of the Real Fabbrica Ferdinandea, the tradition was resumed, accrediting its excellence to such a level that, when it ceased its activity in 1805, the production of porcelain could be perpetuated by individual craftsmen endowed with technical and creative qualities that have allowed them to meet the demands of the market up to the present day.
If Capodimonte holds the primacy of art porcelain, Vietri sul Mare certainly holds the title of Campania's capital of ceramics, a form of craftsmanship that has developed since the 1400s and exploded in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries with a production growth that has also involved other neighboring centers, such as Nocera, Cava de' Tirreni and Salerno.
The transition from artistic ceramics to consumer ceramics, characterized by Mediterranean shapes and colors, took place between 1920 and 1940, by a large group of artisans and artists from Northern Europe who are credited with the relaunch, also commercial, of Vietri production.
Developed in the wake of the successes of the Vietri ceramists, the production of Cava de' Tirreni has been consolidated with the specialization in glazed ceramic tiles whose decorative motifs find inspiration in the Vietri tradition and in the art of Neapolitan majolica.
On the other hand, the evolution of the ceramics of San Lorenzello and Cerreto Sannita, in the province of Benevento, is completely autonomous, which still reproduce various objects with eighteenth-century silhouettes with decorations of flowers, fruit and birds, in yellow, orange, green and blue colors, or holy water fonts, pharmacy and preserve vases, medallions and majolica tablets narrating the life of the Saints.
CERAMICS AND TERRACOTTA IN
[Abruzzo•Basilicata] [Calabria•Campania] [Emilia•Latium•Liguria]
[Lombardy•Marches] [Piedmont•Apulia] [Sicily•Tuscany]
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