Savona and Albissola celebrates the ceramic work of Enrico Baj on the centenary of his birth

From Oct. 8, 2024, to Feb. 9, 2025, the Museum of Ceramics in Savona and MuDA - Museo Diffuso Alb isola in Albissola Marina, in the venues of the Exhibition Center and Casa Museo Jorn, will host the exhibition BAJ. BajchezBaj, curated by Luca Bochicchio and the museums’ curators, on the occasion of the centenary of the birth of Enrico Baj (Milan, 1924 - Vergiate, 2003), one of the most important protagonists of 20th-century Italian art. The exhibition will focus on Baj’sceramic work in its historical and chronological development, with a thematic focus on the 1954International Ceramics Meeting.

The three venues will be like time capsules, reversing the historical path that saw Baj work with clay and glazes, beginning in Albisola in 1954 and arriving in Castellamonte in 1994, passing through Laveno in 1955 and then Imola and Faenza in the early 1980s and 1990s. Of great interest will be the exhibition of early nuclear ceramics in the plastic and organic context of Casa Museo Jorn, where the metamorphosis of images and materials spontaneously recalls Baj’s poetics.

A specific section at the Museum of Ceramics in Savona will delve into the relationship between Enrico Baj, Asger Jorn and the rest of the international post-surrealist cohort, devoting itself to the 1954 International Ceramics Meeting, the seventieth anniversary of which will be celebrated in 2024. On display at the MuDA Exhibition Center in Albissola Marina will be the large, lively figurative and mythological ceramics of the kitsch phase, made at Bottega Gatti in Faenza in the early 1990s. Some of these works, along with the grotesque tribal masks produced in Castellamonte, will be present in the other museum venues, in a synchronic arrangement that intends to put works from different periods in dialogue, demonstrating the transitions but also the great expressive coherence that characterize Baj’s ceramic sculpture.

On the occasion of the centenary of the Milanese artist’s birth, and again under the title BAJ. BajchezBaj, anextensive retrospective promoted by the City of Milan - Culture, produced by Palazzo Reale with Electa and curated by Chiara Gatti and Roberta Cerini Baj will also open on October 8, 2024. This exhibition will present nearly fifty works, covering a time span from the early 1950s to the dawn of the 2000s. The scientific collaboration between Savona and Milan, between the curators and the institutions involved, aims to create two autonomous but complementary itineraries capable of paying homage to Baj’s eclectic genius. These routes are documented in a unique catalog, published by Electa, which explores places, forms, materials and encounters, tracing Baj’s fascinating cosmogony, an epiphany of intelligence and creativity.

Savona and Albissola celebrates the ceramic work of Enrico Baj on the centenary of his birth

Warning: the translation into English of the original Italian article was created using automatic tools. We undertake to review all articles, but we do not guarantee the total absence of inaccuracies in the translation due to the program. You can find the original by clicking on the ITA button. If you find any mistake,please contact us.