Charles Crodel - painter and craftsman
Nowadays you would probably call him an all-rounder. His work is all-encompassing: from paintings to vessel decoration for ceramics, pictorial interior design, mosaic pictures for walls and floors. Hedwig Bollhagen was also fascinated by his varied interests. Hedwig Bollhagen came to ceramics through Crodel.
Charles Crodel – Important modernist image creator and artist friend
Carl Fritz David Crodel, known as Charles Crodel (September 16, 1894 in Marseille, † November 28, 1973 in Munich) studied art history and archeology. Before and after the Second World War he taught at the Burg Giebichenstein School of Applied Arts in Halle. He has teaching assignments at the Academy of Fine Arts in Berlin, at the Art Academy in Munich and guest professorships in the USA.
Under the National Socialists he was dismissed from his teaching post and several of his works in public space were destroyed. During this time, Crodel turns to handicrafts. His works include ceramics and stained glass for more than 150 churches. Crodel's glass window work and construction-related ceramics are among the most important pictorial creations of modernism in Germany. His visits to the ceramic workshops of the State Bauhaus on the Dornburg lead to lasting collaboration with Bauhaus students. He also works closely with the stoneware factories in Velten-Vordamm. He later uses trips to Berlin to work in Marwitz. Through the collaboration with Hedwig Bollhagen, Charles Crodel opens up the field of building ceramics for the HB workshops and brings industry experience to the development of decors. An artist friendship develops between Hedwig Bollhagen and Charles Crodel. Charles Crodel painted the vase, which she submits for the master's examination.