Isabella Pope: an English studio potter and teacher about whom little is known, but whose unusual and technically proficient Planet Pots have intrigued and enthralled buyers every time they have appeared at auction.
This dazzling assortment of Isabella Pope’s Planet Pots, bowls, figures and more will be featured across our November 2024 and March 2025 Fine Art auctions
With our next two upcoming Fine Art auctions, in November and March 2025 respectively, the bulk of Isabella Pope’s enigmatic Planet Pot works and more will be featured – so now is as good a time as any to explore who the mysterious studio potter Isabella Pope was, and how she came to produce such fascinating pieces.
Who Was Isabella Pope?
Having passed away in the 1990s, and avoiding the commercialisation of her work during her career, not a great deal is known about Isabella Pope. However, in addition to being self-taught, she is understood to have served an apprenticeship in traditional pottery-making.
This she utilised to grow her understanding of the techniques and materials involved as she explored classical Chinese forms, which she practised by recreating forms depicted in an old encyclopaedia.
Isabella Pope working on one of her signature Planet Pots
She later forayed into figurative sculpture, finding inspiration in the works of French still life and genre painter Jean Siméon Chardin, which loosened the constraints of her previous work and allowed her to improve her spatial awareness.
This sojourn, however, was relatively brief and Isabella Pope subsequently returned to the discipline of throwing, driven by a desire to emphasise form, colour and texture over function.
This thrown bottle by studio potter Hans Coper is an excellent example of how his work influenced Isabella Pope’s as she took inspiration from his style of surface treatment. (Credit: en.wikipedia.org)
Although she had no formal qualifications, Isabella Pope also used her pottery studio and equipment to teach others, which in turn helped to fund her clay.
The Planet Pots
In an effort to bring something new to the forms she was producing, Isabella Pope turned to the theme of space travel. This led to the creation of spherical pots, and a source of inspiration was the German-born British studio potter Hans Coper, whose surface treatment featured in his pieces informed her own work.
Sold in our March 2023 Fine Art auction, this Planet Pot vase, signed and dated 1991, was hotly contested up to a hammer price of £880
By chance, a remark made by a visitor towards a piece she had made – that it resembled the surface of the Moon – then gave Isabella Pope the inspiration to embark on a project to produce the most distinctive, quirky and recognisable of her works: her Planet Pots.
This large Planet Pot vase, signed and dated 1996, sold in our March 2024 Fine Art auction for £400
Searching for a way in which to elevate or raise her planet forms, she found that her preferred method was to support them with a slender thrown tower, and she leaned most heavily towards this design. Therefore, they are the most numerous type of Isabella Pope’s Planet Pots.
Signed and dated September 1993, this Planet Pot vase featured in our March 2023 Fine Art auction. Keenly fought over by bidders, it blew past its estimate to achieve a hammer price of £980!
Isabella Pope at Auction
With an estimate of £400-£800, this large Planet Pot stands at a height of 61cm. It will be featured in our November Fine Art auction
Despite the relative enigma that is the life and career of Isabella Pope, her quirky and stylish Planet Pots are unambiguously popular, reliably attracting interest at auction.
Among the pieces to be featured in our November Fine Art auction is also an array of fruit bowls and other bowls. This example is estimated at £60-£120
In our upcoming November and March 2025 Fine Art auctions, we will be privileged to feature what is believed to be almost the entirety of Isabella Pope’s work, save for the small number of pieces that remain with the family, and items that have been sold in the past.
An example of her exploration of figurative sculpture, this figure of a footman will be offered in our November Fine Art auction. This piece carries an estimate of £60-£120
Isabella Pope never focused on trying to commercialise her work, and so the pieces we will be offering form the majority of the Planet Pots and other works she created; they are likely never-before-seen pieces.
Standing at a height of 51cm and with an estimate of £400-£800, this large Planet Pot will be featured in our March 2025 Fine Art auction
Also to be featured in our March 2025 Fine Art auction is this Planet Pot, which stands at 30cm. It carries an estimate of £200-£400
This is possibly the most unique and best opportunity for collectors to acquire the works of Isabella Pope, as chances are a collection like this will never be gathered in one place like this again!
Do you have a Studio Pottery collection you are looking to sell?
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