Ceramics and their beauty will soon delight our eyes and soul again in the streets of Modra. A year has passed since last year's festival, and these days preparations for the Clay Festival - Ceramic Modra 2026 are at their peak. The event will take place in April, on April 24th and 25th, in the wider city center. You can find the celebration on Kukučínova, Moyzesova, Na Starý trh, Štúrová and Komunitná záhrad streets.
The town of Modra and the Modra Cultural Center, in cooperation with Slovak Folk Majolica and the SNM-Museum of Slovak Ceramic Sculpture, have once again prepared a varied program of festivities for locals and visitors. You can look forward to a street painted with ornaments, an original assortment of market vendors-ceramicists from various corners of Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary. Don't miss a demonstration of firing ceramics in a clay kiln built in the Old Market area, demonstrations of painting and spinning ceramics on a pottery wheel, demonstrations of crafts, creative workshops for young and old, exhibitions in the museum, Majolica and in the shop windows on Štúrová Street, concerts, performances for children, children's games and a wooden carousel, experiential excursions, walks through the ceramic attractions of Modra and a professional seminar.
The Clay Festival – Ceramic Blue 2026 will be dedicated to the ceramist, sculptor and tiler Jozef Frank, who left us forever last year (1951 – 2025). This important artist left a significant mark on Slovak ceramic art. Jozef Franko came from the former Myslenice (today Grinava), lived and worked in Modra. He trained in Slovak folk majolica, and during his working life he participated in the development of decorative ceramics. His work consisted mainly of depictions of saints, but also of secular figures such as craftsmen, winegrowers, musicians, and robbers.
Franko was also a tiler and one of the three co-founders of the Tilers' Guild. In Modra, the presentation of his work included several joint works that he created with ceramic master and friend Marián Lišek and other ceramicists. For example, a unique ceramic nativity scene - thanks to which the winter event Christmas Stop has the right atmosphere, several ceramic tiles with fairy-tale motifs, or part of the images on the ceramic Stations of the Cross, in the direction of Calvary.
As a tribute to Jozef Frank, the nativity scene will be exhibited during the Clay Festival in the courtyard of the Museum of Slovak Ceramic Sculpture at Kukučínová 15. We will also remember the artist with the thematic exhibition The Legacy of Jozef Frank in Slovak Folk Majolica and the entire Clay Festival - Ceramic Blue, to which you are invited by a poster with a central motif depicting Frank's work - To the Fair, which is part of the collections of the SNM-Museum of Slovak Ceramic Sculpture.
Event program – Old Market
Friday, April 24, 2026
18.00: opening of the event
18.15: Folk music BANDA with the leader Sam Smetan (folklore)
19.00: lighting of the kiln for firing ceramics (Old Market)
20.00 – 21.00: Kapre (ethno – world music)
21.00 – 23.00: Pottery entertainment – ĽH BANDA (folklore), Pivnica Malé divy, Štúrova 80
Saturday, April 25, 2026
10.00 – 10.45: morning jazz – Paper Moon Trio (old jazz)
11.30: DFS Magdalena
1:30 p.m.: Frends bojs (20th century folklore)
2:30 p.m.: Morgonrock Puppet Theater – Then Under the Šlosberg (performance for children)
16.00: female singing parade Vranky from Nitra, Žito from Piešťany, Women from Muzička (folklore)
18.00: Time Lords (world music)
19.00: Pottery Fair (stylized historical procession heads from the Old Market Square, through Moyzesova and Kukučínova, to the St. Florian Fountain)
20.00: Balkansambel (Balkan music)
As part of the accompanying program and a walk through the city, take a look at the shop windows where ceramic workshops will be hosting the exhibition titled Behind Glass:
REMAART ceramics – exhibition by jeweler David Armenec (Štúrova 58)
Miroslav Malinovsky – (Štúrova 60)
Ceramics of Ďureje – interpretation of the Fedor Malík and Son winery (Štúrova 62)
Slovak folk majolica – Wild Kitchen (Na Starom trh 7) and in the window of the Blue city restaurant (Štúrova 64)
Ceramics by Vera Krejza LAB – Sen café (Štúrova 68)
Ceramics Bruno Kollár – Cafe Modur (Štúrova 70)
Ceramics by Daniela Jakubcová – Florist Peter Fraňo (Štúrova 69)
Blue is a member European route of ceramics.
The event is realized with financial support Ministry of Tourism and Sports of the Slovak Republic, Regional Tourism Organization Tourism of the Bratislava Region, Bratislava self-governing region a Regional Tourism Organization of the Small Carpathians.
Galéria
