Last work of art by Karl Clauss Dietel is unveiled
Invitation to the handover ceremony on 29 June, 2 p.m., Wenzel-Verner-Platz
On Thursday 29 June at 2 pm, interested citizens are invited to the official inauguration of the "Kugelensemble" artwork on the newly designed Wenzel-Verner-Platz in the Helbersdorf district, followed by a celebration. The last work of art on which the designer Professor Karl Clauss Dietel, who died in 2022, personally worked for the city of Chemnitz, will then be ceremoniously handed over to the public.
The event is organised by the Kulturbetrieb der Stadt Chemnitz and the Bürgerverein Chemnitz-Helbersdorf e. V. Mayor Dagmar Ruscheinsky will welcome guests on behalf of the city and Jörg Vieweg, Chairman of the Chemnitz-Helbersdorf Citizens' Association, will speak about the work of Karl Clauss Dietel, a designer who is highly regarded and recognised throughout Germany, by design historian Dr Walter Scheiffele.
The inauguration will be accompanied musically by violinists Christiane Korn and Andreas Winkler. The singing group from the AWO children's centre "Schmetterling" will perform at the end of the ceremony and at the start of the subsequent small public festival.
Representatives of the media are also cordially invited. The venue is located in the immediate vicinity of Wenzel-Verner-Straße 64 and can be reached by tram line 4, Ikarus stop, via the Stollberger Straße subway.
The artwork is the light object "Kugelensemble", which has found its location on the newly designed Wenzel-Verner-Platz in Helbersdorf in the Heckert area - as agreed with Professor Dietel. The foundations had already been laid during the design of Wenzel-Verner-Platz. The Chemnitz-Helbersdorf Citizens' Association, in particular Jörg Vieweg, was particularly committed to this location and also worked to ensure that financial resources were made available for the project in 2019 via the Small Projects Fund of the Free State of Saxony.
The artwork consists of nine copper spheres, six of which come from the former Karl-Marx-Städter Kugelbrunnen, which stood in the Yorckgebiet supply centre. Karl Clauss Dietel and his artist colleague Reinhard Grütz designed the fountain, which had 30 spheres at the time, in 1974.
It took four years from the idea of incorporating the six balls remaining from the ball fountain into a new work of art for the public space to its completion. Initially, the reworking of the spheres was more complex than expected, then there were delays due to the coronavirus pandemic and finally the unexpected death of Professor Dietel brought the project to a standstill. The final work was then carried out by the metal construction artist Alexander Bergmann in Dresden, whose grandfather had already produced the spheres for the ball fountain in 1974.