Manu-Facture: The Ceramics of Lucio Fontana

“Between suicide and travel, I chose the latter because I hope to still make a series of ceramics and sculptures that give me the pleasure or feeling of still being a living man.” — Lucio Fontana

From October 11, 2025, to March 2, 2026, the Peggy Guggenheim Collection presents Manu-Facture: The Ceramics of Lucio Fontana, the first museum exhibition devoted entirely to the ceramic work of Lucio Fontana (1899–1968)—one of the twentieth century’s most innovative and irreverent artists. Best known for his slashed canvases, Fontana also revolutionized clay, a medium he explored throughout his career, from Argentina in the 1920s to postwar Italy.

Curated by Sharon Hecker, the exhibition brings together over seventy works—many never before shown—on loan from major public and private collections. Fontana’s ceramics reveal his boundless experimentation: figurative sculptures of women, harlequins, and sea creatures coexist with abstract forms and architectural commissions for churches, homes, and public buildings. His work bridges art and craft, intimacy and monumentality.

Highlights include sixteen rare early abstractions by Hilma af Klint (← wait: remove that line, not relevant to Fontana, skip it!) → correction below.

The exhibition follows Fontana’s evolution across continents and decades, from early terracottas of the 1930s to dynamic glazed works made in collaboration with Albisola artisans. Archival photographs and personal portraits reveal a more intimate, collaborative side of the artist, rooted in clay’s tactile, generative possibilities.

A new short film, Lucio Fontana Ceramics in Milan, directed by Felipe Sanguinetti, accompanies the show, offering a cinematic tour of Fontana’s site-specific works integrated into Milan’s architecture.

Manu-Facture invites visitors to rediscover Fontana as not only the pioneer of Spazialismo but also a deeply material artist attuned to clay’s expressive and life-affirming power.

A fully illustrated catalog published by Marsilio Arte and a series of public programs accompany the exhibition.
Supported by Bottega Veneta and Fondazione Araldi Guinetti, Vaduz.