Maya Fenderl with blue bird, 2024, Photo: Alexander Burzik
about
Maya Fenderl (*1990 in Starnberg) lives and works in Frielendorf, Hesse.
Following an apprenticeship in carpentry and a degree in Fine Art with a focus on ceramics at Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design Halle (Saale), where she graduated in 2024, she works as a sculptor in the field of ceramic sculpture. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, received numerous awards, and is held in several public and private collections.
Fenderl’s formal language emerges through a process-driven interplay of intuition, craftsmanship, and experimental curiosity. It is a dialogue between natural forms and technical constructions. Thrown, extruded, and freely modelled elements merge into complex structures, creating vases that function less as containers than as sculptural compositions—playful, animated, at times grotesque, yet always poetically orchestrated.
With its strong affective potential, colour becomes the carrier of Fenderl’s sculptural narratives. Through colour, form acquires its distinctive character, reflecting a sensitive and expressive engagement with the material and an open, attentive view of the world.
Fenderl understands her works as visual interventions in everyday life. The surreal, the strange, and the absurd become means of disrupting familiar modes of perception—visual incursions that invite moments of wonder, joy, and pause within the habitual.
Maya Fenderl explores the vase as an autonomous ceramic sculpture. Large in scale, intensely coloured, and often unconventional in form, her pieces challenge the traditional understanding of the vessel. A central aspect of her practice is the interplay between form and surface. Colour is not used as decoration; instead, it becomes a formative force. Chromatic contrasts intersect with structural elements, while accentuated fields of colour guide the viewer’s gaze, advancing and receding, and thereby continuing to shape the sculpture visually.
2026 Photo: Maya Fenderl
vita
BIOGRAPHY
1990 Born in Possenhofen, Starnberg
2011-2013 Studied Italian Studies and Art Education, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (LMU)
2013-2014 Attended the International Munich Art Laboratory (IMAL), Munich
2014-2017 Carpentry apprenticeship at the Vocational School for Wood Sculpture and Cabinetmaking, Berchtesgaden
2017-2024 Studies in the Ceramics Department, Burg Giebichenstein, Halle (Saale)
2024 Diploma in Fine Arts (Ceramics), Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design, Halle (Saale)
Maya Fenderl lives and works in Frielendorf, Hesse
Awards/ Scholarships
2026 Emerging Artist Award for Ceramics, Pulverturm, Oldenburg
2024 Young Talents scholarship, Museum of arts and crafts, Hamburg
2024 Bavarian state prize for Design, München
WORKS IN PUBLIC COLLECTIONS / MUSEUMS
Moritzburg Art Museum, State Museum of Saxony-Antony, Halle (Saale)
New Collection-The Design Museum (Pinacotheca of the Modern) , Munich. Recently at inetrnational Ceramics Museum, Weiden.
Exhibitions
2026
Transformation und Variation, Galerie Handwerk, Munich
Flashback art Fair, Turin
Galerie am Hofgarten, Munich
Landscape, Kulturbahnhof-südflügel, Kassel
Positions Art Fair, Berlin
Exoten, Pulverturm, Oldenburg (SOLO)
ceramic positions, Paper positions Art fair, Berlin
Art Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe
Danner- expo, IHM, Munich
Echoes of shape, Yvonne Hohner Contemporary, Karlsruhe
Exil Export, Spinnerei Halle 14 UG , Leipzig
Ceramic brussels Art fair, Belgium
Ceramic Brussels Art Fair, 2026. Photo Geoffrey Fritsch
2025
Positions art fair, Yvonne Hohner Contemporary
Richard Bampi Prize, State Art Collection, Dresden
Exklusive Landpartie 3.0, Galerie am Dom, Wetzlar
Art Bad Gastein, Yvonne Hohner Contemporary
Zeitkunstgalerie, Halle (Saale)
Galerie Am hofgarten, Nymphenburg Palace, Munich
2024
young talent scholarship, Museum of Arts and Crafts, Hamburg
Grassimesse, Leipzig
Twins, Diploma Exhibition, Galerie im volkspark, Halle (Saale)
Wahlverwandschaften, (Forum for Applied Arts Nuremberg), New Museum, Nuremberg
The Moment you Know, Halle 14, Spinnerei, Leipzig
Look what we found, Basel
aufgetischt, kunst und gewerbeverein, Regensburg
Talente Competition, IHM, Munich
2023
NO DRESSCODE Galerie Rund3 , Kambs
ABC: T für Traum, Burggalerie im Volkspark, Halle (Saale)
Burg Voyage, Representation of Saxony-Anhalt, EU-Parliament, Brussels
Teloneros, museum of Art Moritzburg, Halle (Saalle)
2022
Nomination for Young Talents 2022, potterymarket Iznang
Dießen Ceramics Market, Bavaria
Galerie Nord, Halle
Galerie Zeitkunst, Halle
Landpartie 2.0, Kunst und Werkhof Großropperhausen, Galerie am Dom, Wetzlar
2020
Stockschwamm ,(Burg Giebichenstein Ceramics Class Exhibition), Galerie Handwerk, Munich
2019
WESEN , 196tm Gallery, Leipzig
Gallery Töplitz, Werder/ OT Töplitz
Student Café Konsum, Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design, Halle (Saale) (Solo)
2017-2024
Annual participation at Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design annual exhibition, Halle
Heute mit Hut, 2023. Photo: Alexander Burzik