Artist: Jonathan Baldock

Opening in January 2026, Jonathan Baldock’s sculptures are presented within India Mahdavi’s luminous yellow interior, continuing the venue’s commitment to transforming the restaurant as a living, ever-changing artwork. Following in the footsteps of high calibre collaborators including David Shrigley, Yinka Shonibare CBE RA and Martin Creed, Baldock’s intervention marks a vibrant new chapter for sketch, one that brings his unmistakable blend of craft, humour and joy into the heart of London.

Since sketch was first conceived in 2002, it has always mirrored the fluidity of an artist’s sketchbook, an environment in constant motion, shifting with each collaboration while maintaining its distinctive design language. Baldock’s installation builds on this legacy with a dynamic and immersive presentation of works across the Gallery restaurant. He playfully brings his own mischievous pops of pink, texture and personality.

Masks

At the core of the installation is a display of 84 works from Baldock’s Maske series, encircling the walls. Arranged in a continuous, staggered configuration, the masks create a hypnotic visual rhythm that activates the room.

Rippling sheets of clay suggest folds of skin, while carved recesses and protruding forms show eyes, ears and nostrils. Some masks articulate universal emotions; others merely whisper the suggestion of a personality. Variations in temperament emerge through the artist’s experiments with ceramic techniques: coloured clays, painterly glazes and firings at different temperatures give rise to lustrous surfaces, gritty textures and earthen, melancholic tones.

Flowers

Around the bar, Baldock presents a selection of sculptural works from his Flowers series, with two additional pieces welcoming guests at the reception. These works draw from the artist’s personal history, his relationship with his mother, her garden and the emotional landscapes that shaped him. Flowers bloom into faces and blossoms morph into bodies that are humorous and tender. These pieces carry the theatricality and camp sensibility for which Baldock is celebrated - it’s playful, expressive and never quite what they first appear to be.

Cocoons

Suspended within the central dome, works from Baldock’s Warm Inside installation introduce an atmospheric, soaring focal point. Created through labour-intensive processes of wool spinning, plant dyeing and basket-weaving, the cocoons highlight the intimate relationship between body, material and craft. Weaving himself, quite literally, into a thousand-year-old tradition, Baldock positions these forms in a cyclical dialogue between ancient techniques, personal memory and contemporary sculpture.

The Gathering rehang honours Mahdavi’s setting while expanding the sensorial and emotional reach of the room, reinforcing sketch’s reputation as one of the first restaurants to treat artistic intervention as a serious, ever-evolving cultural practice. There is a fitting resonance in the way Baldock creates the Maske works with no sketchpad at all, usually an intuitive, immediate process guided purely by instinct, while his flowers and cocoons begin life as drawings. Both the spontaneity and preparation subtly echoes sketch’s own ethos: a space where the unplanned and the meticulously conceived sit side by side, evolving in real time like pages in a living sketchbook.

Mourad Mazouz, Owner of sketch, says:

“I am pleased to unveil this next chapter of the Gallery, created with Jonathan. At sketch, I have always believed in championing British artists, giving them the space to experiment, provoke and inspire. This new evolution continues that spirit, and I could not be more excited to share it.”

Jonathan Baldock says:

“I am grateful for the opportunity to exhibit my work at sketch restaurant, following in the footsteps of artists I admire. I have been a fan of sketch since visiting in my early 20s, and I'm looking forward to being a part of its ongoing legacy.”