24 silver Picasso plates valued at up to $2.3m

A complete set of 24 silver Picasso plates is to sell at Sotheby's Boundless: Contemporary Art in Hong Kong.

The collection is expected to make $1.5m-2.3m in the June 23 sale.

Picasso silver Sothebys
Picasso created the silver plates in collaboration with metalworker Francois Hugo

Picasso commissioned metalworker Francois Hugo (grandson of author Victor Hugo) to produce the set of plates to his designs in 1967.

They were based on the ceramics Picasso began making after a trip to a pottery exhibition in Vallauris, France in 1946.

A limited run of 20 were produced and only revealed to the public at large at exhibitions in Paris and London in 1977.

They display the themes Picasso was preoccupied with at that time, including bullfighting and his second wife, Jacqueline Roque.

This is the first time a full set has been offered for auction.

Isaure de Viel Castel, head of Boundless Sales at Sotheby's Hong Kong, said: "Extraordinarily precious in material and rare in quantity, Picasso's 24 silver plates offered as a single lot provide an unprecedented acquisition opportunity for collectors from the region and beyond."

Individual plates have sold for major sums in the past, with a single specimen (titled Visage Geometrique) making £49,250 ($77,126) at Christie's in 2011.

We have this Picasso-signed postcard for sale.  

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