Hans Hedberg 1917–2007
Hans Hedberg was born in Sweden in 1917 and lived most of his life in southern France. He is known for his large-scale ceramic works and installations. His style is marked by textural, mottled surfaces, joyful colors and reoccurring motifs of fruits and birds eggs, depicted on a monumental scale. An avid traveler, after serving in World War II, Hedberg studied at the Royal Danish Academy in Copenhagen and the Académie Colarossi in Paris. His initial artistic inclinations were toward painting but he became seriously interested in the ceramic traditions he encountered while visiting Capri, Italy in 1947. He studied at the Instituto d’Arte della Ceramica in Faenza for two years, after which he established a studio in Biot, France in 1949, not far from Picasso's ceramic studio in Vallauris. As Hedberg’s reputation grew, he entertained such artists as Fernand Léger, Marc Chagall, and Jean Cocteau. He was progressive in his use of plaster molds, experimental glazing techniques and the impressive scale at which he worked. His imaginative and alluring ceramics are held in such prestigious collections as The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Musee National de Ceramique, Sèvres, France, the royal collections of Sweden, Morocco and Spain, along with a dedicated museum for his oeuvre in Örnsköldsviks, Sweden. Hedberg passed away in 2007 in Cannes, France.
