Sotheby’s is delighted to present a group of studio ceramics from the family of Ove Arup, the renowned engineer and philanthropist. The works that encompass Property from the Family of Ove Arup in the Made in Britain sale are a product of Arup’s close friendship with Lucie Rie: the group were acquired by Arup directly from Lucie Rie (or perhaps gifted by the artist to him).

Arup first came to know of Rie’s practice in 1945, when he happened to buy some of her pieces at the antique store Heal’s in London. He admired the approach of Rie and Hans Coper, who was first her assistant, and from there, he came across their work on travels to the Triennale in Milan, Italy and in New York, Philadelphia and Harvard in the U.S.A. In his opening speech for the 1956 Exhibition of Celadon Pottery and Porcelain at the Berkeley Galleries in London, Arup praised the two artists for establishing ‘contact and understanding between the artist and audience which is so essential for the thriving of true Art’. This exhibition was one of the first to internationally debut the joint work of Rie and Coper, who presented a group of ceramics that are now considered as some of their most recognisable forms.

Born in Vienna to a family of liberal Jews, Rie arrived in London as a refugee from Vienna in 1940. In Vienna Rie studied under teachers including Adolf Loos and the painter Oskar Kokoschka, and as a result she had originally contemplated a career in science. At the same time, the British-Danish born Arup studied philosophy and engineering at the University of Copenhagen in the early 1920s, where he was influenced by the writings of Le Corbusier and Walter Gropius, founder of the Bauhaus movement.

In his 1956 opening speech, Arup highlighted the link between his own practice and those of the ceramicists, describing Rie and Coper as potters who were ‘endeavouring to make practical and pleasant things for the home, things that would harmonise with good contemporary Architecture’. The contemporary ceramicist Edmund de Waal has also noted that, in particular, Rie and Coper were ‘exceptional among the craftspeople of their generation in their resonance with and recognition by contemporary architectural practice’, which is wholly exemplified in the support and belief that Arup had in the pair from the early days.

During their friendship, Rie made trial chess pieces for Arup, following his Arup Chess Notation system devised in the late 1960s, and they continued to stay close decades after this, with records of his frequent visits to the artist’s pottery studio in Rie’s diaries dating from the 1970s.

Founded in 1946 by Ove Arup, the Arup Group enjoyed significant success and fast expansion throughout the second half of the twentieth century. In the early days, the firm rose to prominence with its cutting-edge structures for the Sydney Opera House and the Penguin Pool at the London Zoo, for example. The company has since launched the Ove Arup Foundation, which is dedicated to the funding, education and diverse creative practice in the field of design and the arts.

Through the breadth of his company’s projects and reputation and his own personal inquisition, Arup was able to access many beautiful ceramic works of art and he built an impressive and diverse collection. Notably, he lent from his ceramics collection to exhibitions including at the V&A Museum in London. The catalogue for the 1997 Barbican exhibition Potters in Parallel - Lucie Rie and Hans Coper highlights Arup’s seminal role in the careers of these artists, writing that “Architects and engineers were amongst their earliest collectors and patrons, Ove Arup being one of them”, a role that is still felt through exhibitions, publications and collections today.