The Journal of Australian Ceramics Vol 50 no 1 April 2011

Tribute
Vale Paul Soldner 1921 - 2011
In early January 2011, Paul Soldner, one of the
greats of American ceramics, passed away at his
home in Claremont, California. He was eightynine.
Born in 1921 into a family of Midwest
Mennonite Christians, Soldner's interest in art
was sparked by his wartime experiences in the
army medical corps, where, to quote Jori Finkel
writing of Soldner in the Los Angeles Times,
he saw ... "beauty emerge from terror in the
form of charcoal drawings made by Holocaust
victims on the barracks walls of the Mauthausen
concentration camp in Austria".
(Frinkel, J. Los Angeles Times 4 January, 2011)
In 1954 Soldner became the first graduate
student of Peter Voulkos in the newly established
ceramics program at the Los Angeles County
Art Institute. Like Voulkos, Soldner was given to
experimentation and innovation and was also
something of a showman, soon becoming what
Garth Clark refers to ... "as one of the stars of the "workshop circuit".
(C lark, G. Shards, p.289)
Photo reprinted from
Pottery in AustraUa
Vol 10, No 1. Autumn
1971, page IS
It was during one of these workshops that Soldner famously 'discovered'
his technique of 'American raku', where pots were drawn from the kiln
and then 'smoked' in various ways to produce a range of effects much
broader than those found in the original Japanese technique. But Soldner's
oeuvre extended well beyond this, encompassing a wide range of ceramic
techniques and forms.
Paul Soldner was a charismatic teacher and tireless maker who came to
prominence at a time and in a place when ceramics was breaking many
boundaries. He continued to contribute to the development of ceramics
both in the United States and on an international level throughout a long
and productive life, and he will be both celebrated and missed.
Damon Moon
Willunga 2011
THE JOURNAL OF AUSTRALIAN CERAMICS APRIL 2011 11