“The exhibition Artifices Instables, Stories of Ceramics presents a journey through inventions and experiments highlighting the diversity of shapes and decorations of ceramics, as well as its production processes. These different stages of production – the selection and preparation of clay, the shaping, the finishing, the decoration, the cooking and the enamelling – reveal, also, the ‘recipes’ and the almost alchemic preparations which vary from one creator/inventor to the other.

Cristiano Raimondi, guest curator at the NMNM for this exhibition, chose to investigate ceramics as a heterogenic and unstable material, able to tell transversal stories. Through a selection of more than 120 pieces by international artists, the curator envisioned a set-up which is a crossover between atelier and a cabinet of curiosities. The exhibition path involves both floors of Villa Sauber, and the works are displayed following the idea of affinity and visual references.” — Nouveau Musée National de Monaco

Exhibition views of Artifices instables, Histoires de céramiques at Nouveau Musée National de Monaco, Villa Sauber.

Curator and scenography : Cristiano Raimondi.

Title image: Left: Poterie artistique de Monaco, Style Fischer (1871-1889). Glazed pottery with polychrome sprigs, 40 x 23,5 x 21 cm. Collection NMNM. Right: Ron Nagle, Coitis Mortis, 2013. Ceramic, glaze, catalyzed polyurethane, epoxy resin, and aluminum, 17 x 22 x 14cm. Collection Silvia Fiorucci Roman, Monaco.

Images courtesy Nouveau Musée National de Monaco.