Ernestine Biography
Ceramics factory, active in the Salerno area since 1948, founded by the architect Matteo D'Agostino, former owner of "D'Agostino Ceramiche" and his partner the American Ernestine Virden Kannon, who holds the role of artistic director. Among the first ceramists active at the factory we remember Carmine Carrera. The factory, after a few years from its foundation, moved from the laboratories of Brignano di Fratte to the factory in via Irno in Salerno, equipped with the most modern equipment and the management of the manufacturing was offered to Guido Gambone who, however, did not accept, so he was appointed artistic director Diodorus Cossa. In 1950, the German ceramist technician, Eng., began to collaborate with the factory. Horst Simonis who successfully experiments with the use of new mixtures of earths and new glazes and pigments. In 1950 some of the company's ceramics were exhibited at the Italian Crafts Exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum in New York. In the second half of the 1950s the factory, which produces modern-style majolica works and biscuit pieces intended for decoration by numerous decorators from Vietri including Renato Rossi, opened workshops in Salerno, in via Roma 33. Over the years they collaborated with the manufacture numerous artists and craftsmen including Nino Caruso, Rudolph Christman and Giacomo Onestini. Production, which enjoyed great success especially in the United States, ceased in 1968, with the death of Matteo D'Agostino.
