Andreas Heege und Andreas Kistler 2020
Adolf Gerber (1859–1919) from Langnau was the first potter in his family. He set up a potter’s workshop in the Tschamerie area of Hasle in 1902. It is not known where he learnt his craft or where he worked before that. On 17th July 1877, he is mentioned as a candidate for the Oberburg section of the Grütliverein (a political society of journeymen and workers) with the job title of potter (Der Grütlianer 26, No. 57, 17/7/1877). We can therefore assume that he worked for one of the potters in Oberburg or Burgdorf.
Of his two sons who also became potters, Adolf (1879-1951) and his workshop in Langnau would go on to be the better-known. The other son, Johann Friedrich (1881-1935), had a workshop at 3 Bernstrasse in Grünen near Sumiswald. In 1919, Adolf’s daughter Ida (1897-1954) married potter Franz Aebi (1894-1974), who had commenced his apprenticeship in her father’s workshop in 1910 and had continued to work there as a journeyman.
According to people who knew him, though only by reputation, Adolf Gerber was said to have been “a fierce disciplinarian”, which made it rather difficult for his apprentices and employees. The workshop did not employ any paintresses, and Adolf Gerber was said to have only made simple “peasant ware” without any figurative decorations (Winter 1983, 10). The two sons were initially employed in their father’s workshop before opening their own. In 1909, Adolf Gerber junior set up a workshop collective with his brother-in law, Oswald Kohler (1886–1955) in Schüpbach, whose sister Marie Kohler (1882-?) he had married on 11th May 1904. Marie’s father Niklaus Kohler (1843–1927) had founded a potter’s workshop in Schüpbach near Langnau in 1869. Johann Friedrich Gerber (1881–1935) worked as a potter in Grünen, municipality of Sumiswald, from no later than 1917, as it can be shown that he employed three journeymen in 1917 and again in 1922. That is all the information we have been able to uncover about the workshop, however, though we can assume that it was located at 3 Bernstrasse.
There are almost no known products still in existence from Adolf Gerber senior’s workshop; to date, only a single plate has come to light that can be attributed to it. Since the impressed, stamped mark on the back reads “A. GERBER U SOHN” [A. Gerber and son], we can probably assume that the plate was made before Adolf Gerber junior left the business in 1909. The mark is almost identical in type to the one that Adolf Gerber junior later used in Langnau.
The motif on the plate was probably based on a drawing by Paul Wyss, the technical instructor from Bern. His templates were extremely popular and were often copied. An ink drawing of the central motif can also be found in the archives of the Röthlisberger potters’ workshop in Langnau. The legend reads “Alter schützt vor Tohrheit nicht und alte Liebe rostet nicht”, which means “There is no fool like an old fool and true love is eternal”.
In 1908, Adolf Gerber (perhaps together with his sons?) took part in a trade exhibition in the Burgdorf Technical School (Intelligenzblatt für die Stadt Bern, 10/9/1908).
In 1919, Adolf Gerber suffered a fatal stroke, and his son-in-law Franz Aebi (1894-1974) was asked to take over the running of the workshop at short notice by Adolf’s widow Marianne Gerber-Uhlmann (1860-1936).
Plate made by Franz Aebi in the year he took over the workshop.
Gerber-Kohler-Aebi family tree
Translation Sandy Haemmerle
References:
Engelbrecht/Gantner/Schuster 1990
Beate Engelbrecht/Theo Gantner/Meinhard Schuster, Berner Töpferei. Mensch und Handwerk, Basel 1990.
Winter 1983
Felix Winter, Töpferei Aebi Tschamerie, Feldforschungsübung des Ethnologischen Seminars der Universität Basel, SS 1983, Töpferei im Berner Oberland, Basel 1983.
