mallams design sale

https://www.mallams.co.uk/sales/oxford/bh091221/?p=1&s=160&v=list#lot-500

A substantial part of the studio is the Daphne Swann collection. Wooley and Wallis estimates are generally fairly low. Nice overall selection with a lot of pieces of solid work. But hardly any Gosh Wow! items.

Nothing wrong with small done well. Mary Rogers, Ursula Morley Price, Deidre Burnett back in the 70's did a lot of beautiful small work. Hand builders themselves often did small work. Indeed it is unusual for John Ward not to have done much small work. Also it is easier on the purse, and ideal for smaller domestic spaces.
On the other hand! You do have to have an excellent eye for a smaller piece collection. It tends to show it s weaknesses more clearly.

Oxford had the long running Oxford Ceramic gallery for many years. Oxford ceramics must have been there for about 15 years now. Trouble with Mallams is its central site. Oxford centre is a nightmare, and park and ride is really the only solution.

I agree with Naomi. It is not Alan Caiger Smith. No signature, not even a Aldermaston glaze code. The style is just different as well.

Its like a little niggle at the back of your mind. Your gaze comes across it and it just pauses for a second in a moment of regret.....You won't forget!

The actual Mallams Design Sale was quite a tame affair. A good deal of it went at the bottom end of the estimate, and most within them. A noterable one was a 15 cm Richard Batterham cut sided Bowl which went for £780. A couple of years ago it would probably have gone for a quarter of that.

Yes indeed, a sale that you could pick up a fairly decent collection of medium range and reputation studio pottery. The estimates are quite tempting, and in today's market may well be where the price ends up. If it sold of course!
The only piece of Real Note is A St Ives Chess Set. Now those are genuinely rare!

https://www.mallams.co.uk/sales/oxford/bh190522/?p=1&s=160&v=list#lot-500
          The results of the latest Mallams sale of studio pottery. Most stuff went within what were relatively low estimates, with not too many unsolds. £1900 for a 38 cms Richard Batterham was interesting. Dan Kelly did badly. De Waal did his average high prices, Lot 524 sold as a Joanna Constanididis for £350, a small yunomi it looked more like the work of Clare Sutcliffe to me.
         On a more trendy note the auctioneer noted that Oxford now has a  low car emissions zone. So he warned customers who collected, to Check on the Council website to see of they needed to. Mallams has an Oxford City Centre site which is quite difficult to get  at by car!

Its markets at the moment, and they are in a state of flux. The bread and butter stuff tends tends to worsen, and the top levels do not get so much, while still holding up reasonably well.
At the top end of the Art Market, world records are still being broken.
Where everything is heading of course is anybody's guess. But given inflation and the Ukraine war. it is a decidedly uncertain outlook.