Lucy Rie 1981 Footed bowl, £260,000 at Phillips.
The Lucie Rie and Hans Coper, Exceptional Ceramics: Selections from the Estate of Jane Coper and the former Collection of Cyril Frankel auction on November 1 posted a hammer total of £6.4m (£8.2m including buyer’s premium).
The 106 lots came from Jane Coper (1932-2022), Hans Coper’s wife and an artist in her own right, and director and f ilmmaker Cyril Frankel (1921-2017).
A new record was set for Rie with a 1981 Footed bowl. Inlaid with pink radiating lines, a turquoise band, golden manganese lip, foot and well, it took a hammer price of £260,000 (or £330,200 including buyer’s premium) against an estimate of £50,000-70,000.
The previous record was set in 2021 in New York.
Hans Coper’s black Cycladic Arrow form from 1976, £510,000 at Phillips.
For Coper, a record was set for a Cycladic form vessel.
The black Cycladic Arrow form from 1976 was hammered down at £510,000 (or £647,700 including buyer’s premium), against an estimate of £180,000-240,000.
Coper’s overall record stands at a hammer price of £520,000 (or £651,700 including premium), set by a ‘coco de mer’ pot from 1968 at the sale of the late New York art dealer Dr John P Driscoll at Phillips in November 2021. In terms of the premium-inclusive auction record price, a Tall bottle vase with disc, which sold at Bonhams’ Design sale in London on October 4, 2022, holds the top spot at £655,500 including buyer’s premium (hammer £520,000).
Domenico Raimondo, Phillips’ head of design in Europe and senior international specialist, said: “This historic result not only marks an unprecedented moment in the global market for British studio pottery, but also in the market for ceramics across the board.
“These two extraordinary collections unveiled the very pieces Lucie Rie and Hans Coper kept and cherished throughout their lifetimes, offering an intimate glimpse into their aesthetic kinship and lives.”
