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Auction heavyweights Pierneef and Hylton Nel deliver solid results at Strauss & Co’s live sales in Johannesburg

24 Jul 2025

Johannesburg – Interest in the work of Hylton Nel, the renowned artist-potter whose work inspired the Dior Men’s summer 2025 campaign, saw two cat sculptures smash their pre-sale estimates at a Strauss & Co auction in Johannesburg. Presented in Contemporary South African Ceramics: New Perspectives, a live-virtual auction celebrating new perspectives in ceramic art held on Tuesday, 22 July 2025, the top-selling lot for the auction was Nel’s painted ceramic sculpture Cat in green and brown (1993), sold for R117 250 / $6 694.

Hylton Nel, Cat in green and brown, 1993

Jacob Hendrik Pierneef, Landscape with Thorn Trees and Distant Mountains, 1928

“Another big surprise were Nel’s three decorated plates, which fetched four times their estimate,” said Wilhelm van Rensburg, Head of Sale, Strauss & Co. “A 2002 plate decorated with praying nude and cat sold R52 763 / $3 012, well above the high estimate. As was expected, two sumptuously decorated tiles by Esias Bosch performed well, one featuring three words selling for R87 938 / $5 020.”

Adds Wilhelm van Rensburg: “I was delighted to see historical stoneware by Rorke’s Drift artists: Dinah Molefe and Henriette Ngako find buyers. The sale successfully debuted Swazi artist Austin Hleza, but the star of the sale, for me, was Mpho Mokgatlhe, whose tri-colour pot with incised and cutout decoration magically evoked a woven basket.”

Nelson Makamo, Drawing Child with Red Glasses, 2022

Hylton Nel, Plate decorated with praying nude and cat, 2002

The ceramics sale was followed by High Note, an evening live-virtual sale of modern and contemporary art that included works from the collection of soprano Mimi Coertse. The star lot was J.H. Pierneef’s iconic 1928 casein Landscape with Thorn Trees and Distant Mountains, which sold above estimate to a telephone bidder for R762 465 / $43 528.

The top-selling works in High Note spanned nearly a century of art and included modernist bellwethers like Pierneef, Walter Battiss, Cecil Skotnes and Irma Stern. Much-admired contemporary artists Deborah Bell, Guy du Toit and Dylan Lewis all posted solid results. Nelson Makamo’s 2022 drawing Child with Red Glasses sold for R293 125 / $16 734, doubling its pre-sale estimate. Works by Christo Coetzee, Cecil Higgs and Esias Bosch from the Mimi Coertse Collection also inspired competitive bidding.

High Note and Contemporary South African Ceramics form part of a trio of curated auctions presented in Johannesburg during July. IMPR: Etchings and Linocuts by JH Pierneef, a concise presentation of 29 works on paper by Pierneef, closes on Monday, 28 Jul 2025. IMPR showcases Pierneef’s remarkable versatility with the print medium and features architectural, arboreal, landscape and portrait subjects.

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