Gordon Baldwin. Little hard clouds becoming vessels.
Due to technical issues related to facility maintenance, the exhibition—originally scheduled to close on 23 December—will now close earlier, on Wednesday, 3 December 2025.
October 3 – December 3, 2025
via G.B. Niccolini 35a, Milan
Exhibition open
Tuesday to Friday
10:30 am – 1:00 pm;
2:30 pm – 6:30 pm.
Saturday:
11:00 am – 6:30 pm.
Free admittance
October 3 – December 3, 2025
via G.B. Niccolini 35a, Milan
Exhibition open
Tuesday to Friday
10:30 am – 1:00 pm;
2:30 pm – 6:30 pm.
Saturday:
11:00 am – 6:30 pm.
Free admittance
Little hard clouds becoming vessels is the first retrospective exhibition in Italy dedicated to the work of British artist Gordon Baldwin (1932–2025), organised in collaboration with Kunstverein in Hamburg and Corvi-Mora, London.
A longstanding presence in the foundation’s collections, Gordon Baldwin is recognised as one of the leading figures of British Modernism. Throughout a long career that combined artistic production with teaching, his work has played a crucial role in redefining the expressive potential of clay as a contemporary artistic medium.
The title of the exhibition is drawn from a passage in Baldwin’s 2008 poem The severity of clouds, itself inspired by a text by Jean Arp in which light clouds descend—by the artist’s will—to the ground, taking the form of sculptures. This reference reflects both the poetic quality of Baldwin’s work and the central role of written production within his artistic process. Strongly connected to the history and culture of ceramics, the term vessel—literally meaning vase, container, or receptacle—appears in Baldwin’s work as a starting point to rethink ceramic practice within the field of sculpture. It becomes an archetype that, throughout his oeuvre, serves as a strong and symbolic and expressive device. Soft and swollen, ethereal like clouds, Baldwin’s sculptures often contain inner cavities that resemble a classical vase shape, or more frequently take the form of small holes across the surface. In all cases, the object’s traditional functionality as a vessel, shifts towards a more conceptual idea of inner space, acting as a threshold between the visible and the hidden.
This conception of an intrinsic nature of forms is expressed in the idea of inscape, a term coined by poet Gerard Manley Hopkins and adopted by Baldwin to describe the changing and unique essence of each thing. In the artist’s creative process, the inscape becomes a mental and spiritual space, physically embodied in concave forms and time-worn surfaces. While the opaque interiors of his works seem to hint at the inner world of the individual—evoking the protected and complex core of human experience—the outer surfaces express its visible manifestation. Often marked by bright colors such as yellows and blues, these exteriors contrast with dark, black-glazed interiors. Incisions and scratches on the surfaces bear witness to layers of thought and adjustment, asserting a new expressive freedom gained within ceramics after the Second World War, while quietly rejecting all forms of decorative excess.
Since the beginning of his career, Baldwin pursued his work with a profound passion for teaching and an openness to dialogue —both with his contemporaries and with poets, artists, and writers from the near and distant past. Bold enough to follow the paths opened by the historical avant-gardes, while working with a medium as rooted in tradition as ceramics, Baldwin counted Surrealism and Dada, along with Duchamp, Arp, Klee and all the art in which not very much happens (Gordon Baldwin in Tanya Harrod Sources of Inspiration, “Crafts”, 1989). Given these references, it is no surprise that drawing and writing, became central to Baldwin’s creative process—both as integral components of his sculptural work and as autonomous media of expression.
The dialogue between Baldwin’s sculptural, graphic, and poetic production informs the recent monograph dedicated to him, published by Kunstverein Hamburg and Edward Hutchison, and also this exhibition. Alongside a selection of ceramic works spanning Baldwin’s career from 1971 to 2008, the show features three works on paper made between 2016 and 2017. While drawing with charcoal had always been part of his practice, in the 2000s it gained a distinct expressive autonomy. These were the final years of the artist’s life, during which his deteriorating eyesight led him to intensify his graphic production—works marked by swift, vertiginous gestures, punctuated by enigmatic phrases and abstract signs that lend a musical rhythm to the composition. Here, the line becomes an interval—just as, in his sculptures, emptiness and suspension are active elements of a composition that defines spaces of conceptual and emotional resonance.
Little hard clouds becoming vessels is a project by Fondazione Officine Saffi, presented under the auspices of the Municipality of Milan and realized in collaboration with Kunstverein in Hamburg and Corvi-Mora Gallery, London.
Gordon Baldwin (Lincoln, 1932 – 2025) studied painting and ceramics from 1949 to 1950 at the Lincoln School of Art, and from 1949 and then again in 1953 at the Central School of Art and Design in London. Appointed head of the prestigious art department at Eton College, he also taught in London at the Central School, Goldsmiths College, and the Royal College of Art. Exhibitions of Baldwin’s work have been held at numerous museums, galleries, and institutions, including Corvi-Mora, London; Contemporary Applied Arts, London; Eton College, Windsor; the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; the Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam; the York Art Gallery, York; Galerie Heller, Heidelberg; the Hetjens Museum, Düsseldorf; and the International Museum of Ceramics in Faenza. His works are held in many private and public collections, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; and LACMA, Los Angeles. Baldwin received numerous prizes, including an OBE (Order of the British Empire) and an honorary doctorate from the Royal College of Art.
A longstanding presence in the foundation’s collections, Gordon Baldwin is recognised as one of the leading figures of British Modernism. Throughout a long career that combined artistic production with teaching, his work has played a crucial role in redefining the expressive potential of clay as a contemporary artistic medium.
The title of the exhibition is drawn from a passage in Baldwin’s 2008 poem The severity of clouds, itself inspired by a text by Jean Arp in which light clouds descend—by the artist’s will—to the ground, taking the form of sculptures. This reference reflects both the poetic quality of Baldwin’s work and the central role of written production within his artistic process. Strongly connected to the history and culture of ceramics, the term vessel—literally meaning vase, container, or receptacle—appears in Baldwin’s work as a starting point to rethink ceramic practice within the field of sculpture. It becomes an archetype that, throughout his oeuvre, serves as a strong and symbolic and expressive device. Soft and swollen, ethereal like clouds, Baldwin’s sculptures often contain inner cavities that resemble a classical vase shape, or more frequently take the form of small holes across the surface. In all cases, the object’s traditional functionality as a vessel, shifts towards a more conceptual idea of inner space, acting as a threshold between the visible and the hidden.
This conception of an intrinsic nature of forms is expressed in the idea of inscape, a term coined by poet Gerard Manley Hopkins and adopted by Baldwin to describe the changing and unique essence of each thing. In the artist’s creative process, the inscape becomes a mental and spiritual space, physically embodied in concave forms and time-worn surfaces. While the opaque interiors of his works seem to hint at the inner world of the individual—evoking the protected and complex core of human experience—the outer surfaces express its visible manifestation. Often marked by bright colors such as yellows and blues, these exteriors contrast with dark, black-glazed interiors. Incisions and scratches on the surfaces bear witness to layers of thought and adjustment, asserting a new expressive freedom gained within ceramics after the Second World War, while quietly rejecting all forms of decorative excess.
Since the beginning of his career, Baldwin pursued his work with a profound passion for teaching and an openness to dialogue —both with his contemporaries and with poets, artists, and writers from the near and distant past. Bold enough to follow the paths opened by the historical avant-gardes, while working with a medium as rooted in tradition as ceramics, Baldwin counted Surrealism and Dada, along with Duchamp, Arp, Klee and all the art in which not very much happens (Gordon Baldwin in Tanya Harrod Sources of Inspiration, “Crafts”, 1989). Given these references, it is no surprise that drawing and writing, became central to Baldwin’s creative process—both as integral components of his sculptural work and as autonomous media of expression.
The dialogue between Baldwin’s sculptural, graphic, and poetic production informs the recent monograph dedicated to him, published by Kunstverein Hamburg and Edward Hutchison, and also this exhibition. Alongside a selection of ceramic works spanning Baldwin’s career from 1971 to 2008, the show features three works on paper made between 2016 and 2017. While drawing with charcoal had always been part of his practice, in the 2000s it gained a distinct expressive autonomy. These were the final years of the artist’s life, during which his deteriorating eyesight led him to intensify his graphic production—works marked by swift, vertiginous gestures, punctuated by enigmatic phrases and abstract signs that lend a musical rhythm to the composition. Here, the line becomes an interval—just as, in his sculptures, emptiness and suspension are active elements of a composition that defines spaces of conceptual and emotional resonance.
Little hard clouds becoming vessels is a project by Fondazione Officine Saffi, presented under the auspices of the Municipality of Milan and realized in collaboration with Kunstverein in Hamburg and Corvi-Mora Gallery, London.
Gordon Baldwin (Lincoln, 1932 – 2025) studied painting and ceramics from 1949 to 1950 at the Lincoln School of Art, and from 1949 and then again in 1953 at the Central School of Art and Design in London. Appointed head of the prestigious art department at Eton College, he also taught in London at the Central School, Goldsmiths College, and the Royal College of Art. Exhibitions of Baldwin’s work have been held at numerous museums, galleries, and institutions, including Corvi-Mora, London; Contemporary Applied Arts, London; Eton College, Windsor; the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; the Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam; the York Art Gallery, York; Galerie Heller, Heidelberg; the Hetjens Museum, Düsseldorf; and the International Museum of Ceramics in Faenza. His works are held in many private and public collections, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; and LACMA, Los Angeles. Baldwin received numerous prizes, including an OBE (Order of the British Empire) and an honorary doctorate from the Royal College of Art.