KPM launches the new MANDORLA collection as a daily and art edition. We interviewed the two minds behind the new product. A conversation with the artist Reiner Xaver Sedelmeier and KPM head designer Thomas Wenzel.

Mr. Sedelmeier, what is it about the mandorla shape that particularly fascinates you?

RXS: On the one hand, it's the pure aesthetics, both of the individual mandorlas and the all-over arrangement. It becomes a fashionable pattern with a floral look! On the other hand, the mandorla is part of a design that is mostly used as a floor or protective plate on construction sites, for example. And I think it deserves more. Basically, I love recharging and reinterpreting objects, materials and items by taking them away from their actual purpose and freeing them from their pure functionality.

How did the jump from metal to porcelain go?

TW: I had been thinking for some time about products that could have a relief. And Reiner's industrial derivation fits perfectly for this relief; a border wouldn't work. I immediately had a movie running on my inner screen and it became clear: MANDORLA fits in with our collections and yet doesn't compete with the existing products.

RXS: In reality, this 'stupid' base plate is somewhere on the floor of a building site. But transferring it to porcelain without further ado doesn't work, it needs an intermediate step, and in this case that's my furniture. For example, the couch, where I actually only raised the material 30 centimeters. When viewers look at the objects, they think: I know that from somewhere! And then the penny drops.

Many people are also familiar with the term from a completely different context, traditional iconography.

RXS: Yes, mandorla is a technical term from art history and refers to a glory or aura around an entire figure. This distinguishes it from a halo, which only surrounds the head. Mandorls are interpreted as a visible expression of a figure 's power of light, salvation and protection. Which, funnily enough, leads back to the protective plate, which has the same function. Protection is a big issue, we want protection, but at the end of the day we rarely get it, and that's exactly what the porcelain says.

The designers of Mandorla: Reiner Xaver Sedelmeier and Thomas Wenzel

So in the end, is this about a transformational achievement?

RXS: Exactly. It's about creating a contrast between the protective sheet steel and the fragility of the porcelain. The only thing I can provide is the thought, the idea. Without the expertise of the manufactory, however, the realization would be inconceivable. It is incredibly beautiful to see the development process and the effort that goes into an object. This know-how and the overwhelming history... It's great that a company with such a history can implement such a contemporary approach.

You have opted for a cylindrical basic shape, why?

TW: Steel is traditionally rolled, so the starting point for me was clearly the cylinder or, in other words, the tube. As a 1:1 translation of the derivation in which a material becomes a product. The viewer can then associate the teardrop sheet in a self-experiential way. The fact that we chose cookie porcelain as the material emphasizes the sharpness and precision and the tactile experience of the unglazed surface.

Mandorla is being launched both as a permanent new collection from KPM Berlin and as a limited art edition. What is the difference between the two versions?

RXS: It is the refinement that takes place here (and often in my other work) through surface application: metallic silver and gold, sometimes real gold, but also shades of neon in pink, orange, yellow .... Depending on the incidence of light, the colors change, the reflections form a radiant shell around the actual mandorla. Which, in a way, creates a very special aura.

Which product from the collection do you like best?

RXS: My favorite product is the cup, because it also has a tactile feel. You hold it in your hand and feel the structure - which you normally only walk on with shoes.

TW: For me it would be the vase. I find it formally very coherent in context. It is precisely the uncompromising derivation from a consistent, geometric industrial form that makes it a modern but timeless sculpture. It unites this arc of tension perfectly.

The transformation of industry, art and manufacturing explores the crossing of boundaries and the conceivable in an exciting way. A familiar "irritation" of visual habits keeps an inner dialog alive.

The relief (worked out in the casting process) lies in the user's hand

Photos: Simone Schneider