Solothurn Pottery Society
The Solothurn Pottery Society is a lecture society founded in Solothurn , Switzerland in 1857 . With general educational and literary lectures by personalities from all fields and areas of life, such as Karl Jaspers , Thomas Mann , Günter Grass and Konrad Lorenz , it occupies an important position among the Swiss lecture societies.
19th century
In 1857 only a few years had passed since the introduction of the Swiss Federal Constitution of 1848 and the differences of opinion between the various political camps, especially within the Liberals , who had gained the upper hand in 1848, were still being fought out with great vehemence. In the canton of Solothurn in 1856 the radical liberals, as advocates of direct democracy , had won a clear victory over the old liberal supporters of a representative system by winning a vote on the cantonal constitution and gaining a majority in the Grand Council and Government Council . Even if the situation calmed down somewhat, the political climate remained irritable.
In this situation, the pottery company as an attempt was "interested in spiritual matters personalities of the city regardless of their party affiliation on neutral ground together," founded. The experiment was initiated by Georg Schlatter, Rector of the Höhere Lehranstalt, and taken up by Wilhelm Vigier , the newly elected radical-liberal Landammann . Almost a dozen representatives from various branches of science accepted Vigier's invitation in the fall of 1857 to the large classroom of the college, where the decision was made to hold a series of general educational lectures during the winter. The government made the cantonal council chamber available for the events free of charge.
Since the first season was very successful and each of the twenty lectures was well attended, the initially nameless society continued its activities in the following years. Among their first speakers were the writers Alfred Hartmann and Franz Krutter , who later became the Bishop of Basel, Friedrich Fiala , and the geologist Eduard Desor , to whom the creation of the name Töpfergesellschaft is ascribed.
The name of the company refers to the fact that the speakers should not only pay attention to the content, but should also design their presentation carefully - like a potter his mug. In addition, echoes of the medieval guild system were common in non-profit and cultural societies of the 19th century. One became and becomes a “journeyman potter” by following the invitation of the pottery society to give a lecture in Solothurn. Apart from that, the company has no membership and only an informally composed executive board.
When an overview of the first ten years of the society by Franz Krutter was published in 1867, the pottery society was already a firmly established part of Solothurn's cultural life. Under its first so-called old journeyman Alfred Hartmann and his successors, the society remained a loosely organized academy that was never supposed to have statutes . However, it continued to appeal to a large audience with its broad program. It thus moved in an environment of numerous lecture societies that flourished in the 19th century, and was able to assert itself in Solothurn despite specific societies (e.g. historical association, natural research society) that also held lectures.
20th century
From the beginning, the pottery society had also explicitly addressed a female public; on March 2, 1900, the first woman to give a lecture was Adeline Rittershaus , a philologist who specializes in Icelandic language and literature . Lectures by women, however, remained a rarity in the first decades of the 20th century. In the 1920s, writers such as Lisa Wenger , Anna Richli and Cécile Lauber were invited to readings from their works in Solothurn. In contrast, the question of women has not been touched upon since a lecture by Carry Lüthy in 1913, who had vigorously advocated equality and women's suffrage.
The choice of speakers became increasingly international. For example, the German writers Max Halbe (1906), Otto Ernst (1909), Karl Henckell (1911) and Ludwig Ganghofer (1913) can be named.
Also in the 1920s and 1930s lecturers from every ideological and political direction, especially from Germany, could be found in the pottery society. The spectrum ranged from the active National Socialist Hermann Burte to the Jewish writer Jakob Wassermann to the communist Ludwig Renn . In 1921, 1934 and 1935 Thomas Mann read from his works in front of the pottery company. The Mann family was also represented in the pottery company with Heinrich Mann in 1931 and, most recently, Golo Mann in 1968.
The Second World War brought the potter society through the elimination of foreign speakers and decreased domestic capacity some difficulties. Some of the potential speakers were in active service . Also, the canton council hall could no longer be used by society due to the rationing of coal and so another venue had to be used: the auditorium of the old canton school.
After the war, the canton council chamber could be used again and the company recorded a. a. thanks to their collaboration with the Kunstverein a large increase in the audience. Despite new media such as cinema, radio and the emerging television, direct contact with the speakers seems to have continued to offer the audience a special attraction. In the 1950s and 1960s there was often hardly any space in the hall; Examples of particularly attractive speakers at this time are the Capuchin preacher Heinrich Suso Braun , whose appearance in 1964 is said to have "refurbished" the pottery cash register in one fell swoop , and the historian Golo Mann , who in 1968 asked for his fee to be doubled in view of the good attendance of his lecture.
Hans Erhard Gerber, senior journeyman of the pottery society from 1957 to 1971, was able to secure a significance for the pottery society that went far beyond the city, especially in his specialist field, literature. During his term of office you can find in the guest book of the pottery society u. a. Entries from:
- Ilse Aichinger
- Alfred Andersch
- Günter Eich
- Manfred Hausmann
- Uwe Johnson
- Wolfgang Koeppen
- Adolf Muschg
- Wolfdietrich Schnurre
- Martin Walser
In the 1970s, the general public acceptance of the post-war period increasingly ebbed and the group of visitors became “the longer, the more static and homogeneous. In particular, the society now had a strong bourgeois image, people on the left did not even come to lectures by people like Bichsel , who had close ties to these circles. ”The fact that the pottery society's visitors increasingly consisted only of the regular audience is also related with the growing importance of electronic media as well as the less attention given to pottery lectures in the daily press. A low point was reached in the early 1980s: no more than two or three people attended individual lectures.
After the dissolution of the company had even been up for discussion at that time, a better attendance was slowly achieved again, among other things through increased advertising for its lecturing activities. During the tenure of senior journeyman Rolf Max Kully (1984–1989, then director of the Solothurn Central Library ) and his successor, veteran Verena Bider (1992–2008, co-director of the central library since 2002), the society was associated with the central library, in whose reading room held most of the lectures from 1992 to 2008. Another important event was held at the Kunstmuseum Solothurn . Since the 2008/2009 season, the lectures have mainly been held in the Blumenstein Historical Museum .
present
The pottery society continues to hold its traditional series of lectures every winter. Even if the number of lectures and visitors from the heyday is hardly reached, the pottery society is still very important in Solothurn's cultural life. The range of lectures offered is broad and colorful, in keeping with the original spirit of society. At a younger audience lectures were directed in the 2000s as those of science fiction -Autors Marcus Hammerschmitt or comic experts Cuno Affolter . Scientific subjects such as parasitic parasitic wasps or military subjects such as the presentation of the Swiss Air Force are just as much a part of the offer as art historical and literary subjects or lectures by church dignitaries. Points of comparison are always topicality, originality and social significance as well as the polished shape.
Publication activity
After individual lectures held in front of the pottery company had already appeared in printed form, a series of publications entitled "Mitteilungen der Töpfergesellschaft Solothurn" was founded in 1906 , in which several lectures were published in loose succession until 1925. In addition, anniversary publications and in 1988 a list of the lectures held up to that point appeared. The series that had fallen asleep was revived in 1997 by veteran Verena Bider with a "New Series" ( ISSN 1423-3401 ), in which nine publications had appeared by 2007. Some lecture texts can also be found on the website established in 1999.
swell
- Töpfergesellschaft Solothurn: Complete list of the lectures given from 1857 to 1988. Edited by Max Wild. 1988
- Nef, Andreas: A very strange club. 150 years of the Solothurn pottery company. Solothurn 2007. (Announcements from the Solothurn Pottery Society; New Part 8)