Ferdinand Henning was born in the sixties and grew up in a small town in the Karoo. After his studies in Stellenbosch and a year of backpacking through Europe he started making jewelry and sculptures in non-ferrous metals.
He exhibited regularly at Grahamstown Art Festival and at the Bloemfontein Art market, Durban Craft Market and Magnoliadal market in Pretoria during mid 80’s and early 90’s. Then the travel bug bit again and he hitchhiked through Eastern Europe and USA for nearly a year.
When he came back he got caught up in the corporate world until two years ago when he decided to go full time into ceramics.
"Most of my works are figurative pieces built from slabs or coils. Each piece is unique, the result of many hours’ work. Each piece is a one-of-a-kind original work of art and no two are identical, because they are not mass-produced. My functional pieces are one-off pieces, and give me the same satisfaction as a sculpture due to the individual differences of each piece."
Ferdinand lives in Melkbosstrand (near Cape Town) and works from his studio in the quaint little town of Philadelphia about 20 km away.