Solid auction result in February for private collection underscores Strauss & Co’s specialist leadership in handling single-owner sales

4 Mar 2026

Strauss & Co, Africa’s leading auction house, continues to demonstrate its specialist expertise in the stewardship and sale of important single-owner collections, achieving excellent results in February with an important collection and announcing a series of significant private collections to headline its March 2026 season in Cape Town.

On Saturday, 21 February 2026, Strauss & Co presented Portway to Cohen: A Collector’s Legacy and Other Properties, a live-virtual sale held in Cape Town. Capping a vibrant programme of auctions, exhibitions and talks during the period of the Investec Cape Town Art Fair, the sale featured 73 lots from an esteemed private collector, offering a focused survey of modern and contemporary South African art.

The single-owner collection was met with robust demand, realising R4 186 250 / $261 115, with 81% of the lots offered sold. Overall, the auction Portway to Cohen: A Collector’s Legacy and Other Properties R4 888 574 / $304 938 with a sell-through rate of 74%.

Competitive bidding drove a number of works beyond their pre-sale estimates. Two works on paper by Berni Searle exceeded expectations, as did paintings by Norman Catherine, Alexandra Karakashian, Gladys Mgudlandlu, Lucky Sibiya and Cecil Skotnes, all from the collector’s consignment. Searle’s ethereal photographic work On Either Side (2005), twice exhibited at the

Museum of Modern Art in New York, realised R531 415 / $33 160. Sibiya’s large figural composition The Village (1993) achieved R211 050 / $13 167, double its pre-sale estimate.

“The results confirm Strauss & Co’s strength in managing the sale of important single-owner collections of art,” says Bina Genovese, Managing Executive, Strauss & Co. “Collectors entrust us with works that often represent decades of personal engagement with art and artists. Our role is both strategic and custodial. We apply rigorous research, targeted marketing and a deep understanding of the market to ensure that each collection is presented with clarity and authority, achieving outcomes that honour the collector’s legacy while maximising value.”

This specialist capacity will again be in focus on Tuesday, 24 March 2026, when Strauss & Co presents works from the Stan and Li Boiskin Art Collection in its flagship live-virtual Evening Sale: Modern and Contemporary Art. Cape Town cultural patrons Stan and Li Boiskin, long active in community organisations and public life, assembled a distinguished collection of works by major South African modernists, including Maggie Laubser, George Pemba, J.H. Pierneef, Cecil Skotnes and Irma Stern.

The Evening Sale will open with 17 lots from the Boiskin Art Collection, led by Stern’s 1942 arresting gouache, Canoes on the Congo River (estimate R150 000 – 200 000 / $9 360 – 12 480), setting the tone for a tightly curated offering. Highlights from this collection include Pemba’s late work from 1991, The Orator (estimate R350 000 – 500 000 / $21 910 – 31 300), and Pierneef’s 1923 composition Mountain Landscape with a Tree in the Foreground (estimate R300 000 – 500 000 / $ 18 780 – 31 300).

The Evening Sale will also include two lots by Gerard Sekoto and Cecil Skotnes from the Patricia Fine Art Collection. A former mayor of Cape Town, Patricia Fine (née Sulcas Kreiner) was well known for her cultural patronage and civic devotion. Painted circa 1940–41, Sekoto’s Game of Draughts in a Crowd (estimate R800 000 – 1 200 000 / $50 080 – 75 120) appeared in the artist’s career survey at the Johannesburg Art Gallery in 1989.

Strauss & Co’s March auction season in Cape Town will also feature two notable live-virtual sales: Spirit and Substance: A Curated Selection from the Estate Late Dr Rayda Becker (closing 10 March 2026), 40 lots from the collection of art historian Rayda Becker, and Generations of Collecting: An Important Collection of Cape Silver, Oriental Ceramics, Furniture and Art (closing 25 March 2026), 200 lots spanning Cape silver, VOC Arita ware porcelain, fine furniture and South African landscape painting, reflecting the Cape’s historic role as a nexus of European craftsmanship, Asian trade and vernacular design.

Generations of Collecting brings to market a distinguished private collection tracing the material culture of the Cape across the 18th and 19th centuries. Highlights from the collection include an exceptionally early Cape silver tea caddy of 1760 by Johan Anton Bünning (estimate R70 000 – 90 000 / $ 4 230 – 5 440) and a rare communion cup by Daniel Hockley (estimate R30 000 – 40 000 / $1 810 – 2 420), alongside classical Chinese and Japanese ceramics and VOC export wares.

The furniture selection features important Cape pieces, among them an exceptional Van der Stel-period rusbank (estimate R25 000 – 30 000 / $1 510 – 1 810) and a partner’s desk reputedly designed by architect Sir Herbert Baker for Groote Schuur (estimate R15 000 – 20 000 / $910 – 1 210). A strong group of landscape paintings by artists including Gwelo Goodman, J. H. Pierneef and Gregoire Boonzaier further situates the collection within the evolving social and topographical history of the region.

 A respected scholar of indigenous art practices, Becker assembled a diverse body of work that reflects both academic engagement and close personal relationships with artists. Spirit and Substance (closing on Tuesday 10 March) includes works by Gerard Bhengu, Julius Chauke, Johannes Maswanganyi, Phuthuma Seoka and Cecil Skotnes, as well as several unrecorded artists encountered during her field research. Highlights include two angel sculptures by Jackson Hlungwani, whom Becker accompanied to an exhibition at the Watari Museum in Japan in 1995, and the major diptych Oh, Oh, Oh She Cried in a Cracked Voice (estimate R1–1.2 million / $62 400 – 74 880) by her friend, the celebrated artist Robert Hodgins.

Together, these March offerings underscore Strauss & Co’s on-going commitment to presenting single-owner collections with sensitivity and market intelligence.

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March Auctions:

Following on this suite of early February online sales are two special themed auctions to look out for:

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Upcoming Exhibitions:

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