Erzgebirgische Volkskunst Ruth und Roland Paul

Original Erzgebirgische Volkskunst Member of the Förderverein Erzgebirgisches Spielzeugmuseum eV Member of the Fachhandelsrings Erzgebirgische Volkskunst

About us
At the end of the sixties, our wholesaler's Christmas brochure featured smokers as decorations. Since we liked this figure and smoker candles were already sold in my grandfather's drugstore, we asked the manufacturer of the brochure where this figure could be purchased. This decoration company was able to sell us a few copies, but the following year the Christmas brochure was of course decorated with something else. We therefore went to the Frankfurt trade fair and were able to make contact with a West German importer of Erzgebirge folk art. There we also found out that our smoking man came from a factory in the Federal Republic of Germany, which is now naturalized in the Erzgebirge. As the lower export limit to Switzerland was not met with the purchase of various smokers, we topped up the order with a few pyramids. The products from the Erzgebirge were barely on display at home before they were sold. So off we went again to the Frankfurt trade fair. Unfortunately, we had to look for a new importer in Germany at the beginning of the 1970s, as the previous wholesaler no longer stocked products from the Erzgebirge. After a few years, we asked the Swiss general representative for Erzgebirge folk art whether we could buy the products directly, but he said that this was not possible due to a lack of sales in Switzerland and a lack of purchasing quota in the GDR. After a few years, our purchasing volume from the wholesaler had grown to such an extent that we were able to purchase the first limited specialties for us, such as products from Wendt and Kühn, Walter Werner, Wolfgang Glöckner, Günter Leichsenring, Klaus Merten and others. Despite repeated requests to Demusa in Suhl and the GDR embassy in Bern, we were unable to buy directly, but we were invited to exhibit our goods in Basel to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the GDR. As we had no acquaintances in the GDR and a guided bus tour of the GDR was not to our taste, the most we could get was a visa to visit the Leipzig trade fair, but as we were not wholesalers and there was no quota for wooden goods in Switzerland, we were unable to buy anything there. At the beginning of the 1980s, we got in touch with a family in Olbernhau and so we were able to visit the GDR for the first time in 1986 and also leave the Leipzig district with a visitor's visa. Various attempts to order goods directly at the Leipzig trade fair and have them delivered by wholesalers were unsuccessful. It was not until the fall of the Berlin Wall that things changed and today we stock Erzgebirge folk art from over 100 craftsmen and our range has grown to over 6000 items thanks to the success of sales exhibitions at the Swiss Sample Fair, the Autumn Goods Fair and the Christmas Market in Basel. Awareness of the Ore Mountains and their folk art was boosted enormously by the involvement of various craftsmen who demonstrated the manufacture of their products at our exhibitions and were able to sell them themselves.