Facing Salto!

Axel Salto is a beacon within modern, 20th century craft art, and he won major international recognition following his breakthrough at the World Exhibition in Paris in 1925.

We are proud to be able to present the most spectacular range of Salto stoneware ever seen. The works up for auction are representative of much of his artistic oeuvre – from lush oversize vases and giant heads to stoneware in Salto’s famous rippled, sprouting and budding style. 

Det Brændende Nu (The Burning Now)

Several of the Salto works up for auction appeared at “Det Brændende Nu”, the first major retrospective Salto exhibition at the Danish Museum of Art & Design in 1989, to mark the centenary of Salto’s birth. The exhibition showed Salto’s life’s work to an extent never seen before or since, and today is a primary source for understanding his artistic work in ceramics, textiles, book art and graphics.

Among other things, the exhibition featured a colossal stoneware vase with stylised flowers and foliage and a framed sketch of it, as well as the two stoneware heads – “Janus Head” and “Mongol Head”.

Ceramics inspired by nature

Salto had a diverse background as an academy-trained painter, graphic artist and writer. He is best known for his organic stoneware in the characteristic rippled, budding and sprouting style, which is primarily inspired by the creative force of nature. The characteristic idiom attained new dimensions during his cooperation with Royal Copenhagen from the mid-1930s to the late 1950s.

Over time, his stoneware became marked by greater vitality, culminating in the budding style with its potent spiky, impregnable shapes. A style which was directly inspired by natural growth. For Salto, it was not about imitating nature, but rather recreating its spirit. This expressive style was further accentuated by the multi-coloured glazes he used, often ranging from tones of red, brown, yellow, blue and grey.

The auction features a number of these organic works from Royal Copenhagen, including several vases modelled in the budding and sprouting style.

Join us for the preview and the auction!
Auction: Thursday 7 March at 4 pm at Bredgade 33, Copenhagen
Preview: 21–25 February

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