While Lucio Fontana (1899–1968) is best known for his iconic slashed and punctured canvases of the 1950s and '60s, this exhibition casts a spotlight on a lesser-known but essential part of his oeuvre: his work in clay, which he began in Argentina in the 1920s and continued to explore throughout his life. This is the first solo exhibition to offer an in-depth examination of Fontana's ceramic production.
Featuring over seventy works—including several never previously exhibited and on loan from renowned public and private collections—the show seeks to illuminate the full scope of Fontana's sculptural vision in clay, revealing how he regarded the material over the years as a rich, generative site of experimentation. Fontana's ceramic output is notable for its diversity of forms, techniques, and subject matter: from figurative sculptures of women, sea creatures, harlequins, and warriors to abstract forms, his approach to clay revived the age-old ritual of ceramics while embracing innovation.
