Prague, Czech Republic
Water, carbon dioxide and light meet, and life begins. Photosynthesis is the process that inspires Maxim Velčovský’s latest glass vases, objects that treat transformation as their central subject.
Art and design theorist Dr. Stephan Hamel reads photosynthesis as a meeting point between science and something close to the sacred: life arises from a precise choreography of elements, chemistry, light and transformation. For Hamel, there is perhaps a touch of the divine in this, but never a miracle without matter.
Glass belongs to this same language of transformation. It receives light, carries it, bends it and filters it until it becomes something else, a conductor between the visible and the invisible. In Velčovský’s hands, the vase is therefore more than a container.
It becomes a body, an opening, a space where something can be conceived. Its transparency hints at the intimacy of creation while refusing to reveal its mystery completely.
This, Hamel suggests, is where the power of the vases comes from. They are undeniably sensual, yet their eroticism belongs to no particular gender. It is neither masculine nor feminine but something more primordial, evoking the moment before identity and form, when light, matter and water come together and life is about to begin.
The vase becomes a “crown of creation”: a vessel for light, a body for transformation and an image of life itself. Hamel closes with a line that suits Velčovský’s playful spirit: put flowers in your guns, and in Maxim Velčovský’s vases.
All the pieces were produced at the AJETO glassworks, founded in 1994 by Petr Novotný and Bořek Šípek, and at the new Edo Studio glassworks in Svojkov.
About Maxim Velčovský
Maxim Velčovský is one of the most prominent contemporary Czech designers, known for his iconic porcelain and glass objects and his conceptual approach, which often engages with social and historical contexts.
He is the artistic director of Lasvit, and his work is held by institutions including the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Neue Sammlung in Munich, the Centre Pompidou in Paris and the Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague, as well as the Sublime Hyacinth Collection.
His awards include the Czech Grand Design Award, the Elle Decoration Design Awards and the Wallpaper Award.
Project: Photosynthesis
Designer: Maxim Velčovský
Manufacturer: AJETO glassworks and Edo Studio glassworks, Svojkov
