Provenance
Private Collection, Italy
Catalogue Essay
The image of the mythological gorgon figure, Medusa, has been continually revisited throughout art history by artists and artisans alike, inspiring painters and sculptors such as Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, Damien Hirst and Lucio Fontana. Traditionally symbolic of unbridled terror, violence and fear, in Lucio Fontana’s Testa di Medusa, the visage of the gorgon, with her piercing eyes, is frozen in clay, subverting the mythology of Medusa’s deadly glare, which, with a single glance, can transfigure your body into stone.

In the 1930s, Fontana travelled to Albissola and the Mazzotti factory, where he started work on his practice, later returning in the 1940s to continue incorporating his Spazialismo ethos within the medium of clay. Having trained in sculpture and ceramics, Fontana had spent his formative years in his father's studio in Rosario de Santa Fe, Argentina, making religious icons for funerals, such as Christ figures and the Virgin and Child. Working with clay provided Fontana with a reactive and flexible medium, malleable properties which bore a symbiosis with Fontana’s Concetto spaziale. Slashing, tearing, rupturing or penetrating his medium with Murano glass, Fontana looked to marry light, sound and form in his holistic works, creating a new visual dialogue with multidimensionality at the forefront of his enquiry. Evident in the neon tendrils of his pinnacle installation Ambiente spaziale a luce nera, 1949, exhibited at the Galleria del Naviglio in Milan, the deep gouges in his monumental terracotta Natura and the opalescent blend of multi-coloured glazes which dance on the surface of his Crocifissione, Fontana’s practice prises open the possibilities of representation. Caught in a fleeting moment between abstraction and figuration, Fontana’s Testa di Medusa showcases the qualities of his chosen medium and celebrates the movement of the clay in its plasticity. Commenting on Fontana’s deft ability to harness the material properties of clay when handling the medium, art critic and friend Guido Balla noted, ‘his hands created an aerial musicality and he remained silent as though in a trance’ (Guido Balla, quoted in, Valérie Da Costa, Lucio Fontana, Deposizione della Croce, Galerie Karsten Greve, Paris, 2017, online).

59

Lucio Fontana

Testa di Medusa

incised with the artist's initials 'LF' on the reverse
earthenware, lustre glaze
5.8 x 6 x 4.5 cm (2 1/4 x 2 3/8 x 1 3/4 in.)
Executed in 1947-50, this work is registered with the Fondazione Lucio Fontana under archive no. 1173/001.

Estimate
£15,000 - 20,000 ♠

Sold for £37,500

Contact Specialist
Meaghan Roddy
Senior International Specialist, Head of Sale
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+ 44 20 7318 4061 hhighley@phillips.com

Shape & Space: A New Ceramic Presence

London Auction 5 October 2018

51
Kathy Butterly
Overgrown
Estimate £12,000 - 16,000 ‡
Sold for £16,250
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52
This lot is no longer available.
53
George Ohr
Tall two-handled vase
Estimate £80,000 - 120,000 ‡
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54
George Ohr
Mottled two-sided, two-handled vase
Estimate £80,000 - 120,000 ‡
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55
Ken Price
Edo
Estimate £150,000 - 200,000 ‡
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56
Yoshitomo Nara
Untitled
Estimate £60,000 - 80,000 ‡
Sold for £125,000
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57
This lot is no longer available.
58
Claudi Casanovas
Lluna Nova (Juno, La Daurada, Mercè, Nigra sum, Nuria), from the 'Lunar Cycle' series
Estimate £40,000 - 60,000 ♠†
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59
Lucio Fontana
Testa di Medusa
Estimate £15,000 - 20,000 ♠
Sold for £37,500
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60
Ai Weiwei
He Xie
Estimate £400,000 - 600,000 ‡
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61
Lucie Rie
Footed bowl
Estimate £40,000 - 60,000 ♠
Sold for £50,000
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62
Lucio Fontana
Cavallo
Estimate £400,000 - 600,000 ‡♠
Sold for £549,000
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63
Fausto Melotti
Female figure
Estimate £40,000 - 60,000 ♠
Sold for £56,250
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64
Simone Leigh
Untitled
Estimate £10,000 - 15,000 ‡
Sold for £27,500
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65
Sarah Lucas
Toilet Elevation
Estimate £70,000 - 90,000 ♠†
Sold for £87,500
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66
Roy Lichtenstein
Ceramic Sculpture #10
Estimate £250,000 - 350,000 ‡
Sold for £309,000
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67
Peter Voulkos
Untitled vase
Estimate £40,000 - 60,000 ‡
Sold for £40,000
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68
Andrew Lord
The Italian set in intense light. Angled. Black.
Estimate £15,000 - 20,000 ‡♠
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69
Betty Woodman
Balustrade Relief Vase 07-4
Estimate £15,000 - 20,000
Sold for £47,500
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70
Hans Coper
Spade form
Estimate £50,000 - 70,000 ♠
Sold for £62,500
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71
Hans Coper
Cycladic arrow form
Estimate £80,000 - 120,000 ♠
Sold for £102,500
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72
Hans Coper
Cycladic arrow form
Estimate £80,000 - 120,000 ♠
Sold for £156,250
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73
Roberto Lugo
Obama and Me
Estimate £15,000 - 20,000 ‡
Sold for £35,000
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74
Pablo Picasso
Hibou
Estimate £50,000 - 70,000 ♠
Sold for £93,750
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75
Ron Nagle
Tail Dragger
Estimate £12,000 - 16,000 ‡
Sold for £12,500
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76
Ron Nagle
Schtub
Estimate £12,000 - 16,000 ‡
Sold for £13,750
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77
Ken Price
Flat Back
Estimate £150,000 - 250,000 †
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78
Ewen Henderson
Form from the ‘Complex Series’
Estimate £10,000 - 15,000 ♠
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79
This lot is no longer available.
80
Sterling Ruby
The Fed Mortar (Rainbow)
Estimate £20,000 - 30,000
Sold for £50,000
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81
Otani Workshop
Netherworld Resident
Estimate £7,000 - 9,000 ‡
Sold for £6,250
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82
Otani Workshop
Lion Head
Estimate £7,000 - 9,000 ‡
Sold for £6,250
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Shape & Space: A New Ceramic Presence

London Auction 5 October 2018

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Provenance

Catalogue Essay

59

Lucio Fontana

Testa di Medusa

Shape & Space: A New Ceramic Presence

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