GUEST: We call it the ugly thing or the ugly vase. I bought it about 15 years ago. I'm never sure if it's a pregnant woman, if she's getting to topple over. (chuckling) It's a weird little piece. I liked it when I saw it. It comes from a Dutch dealer, so...
APPRAISER: And do you remember how much you paid?
GUEST: Yes, $580.
APPRAISER: It is such a wonderful, Modernist, bizarre piece. It has animal, it has bird, it has female figural. All of this happening in this piece of glazed ceramic that was done by a very famous artist called Jean Cocteau.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: Jean Cocteau was French, and he was a fine artist, a painter, a draftsman. He was also a poet.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: Picasso, a painter of great renown, wanted to move to a different type of medium.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: And had visited this pottery in the town of Vallauris...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...and was taken by their operation and wanted to do some ceramics, in, in editions. Picasso started that in '47, and his good friend Jean Cocteau...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...who did this, could see the pleasure...
GUEST: Mm.
APPRAISER: ...that Picasso had from making these pieces.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: Picasso actually warned him. He said, "Be careful...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: "...about ever starting to do anything in clay, because it will steal your heart and you'll never want to stop."
GUEST: Okay, yeah.
APPRAISER: So apparently he did that. Picasso did this, uh, for longer, and he did over 600 different forms.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: Cocteau, who started in '57 and did that until his death in the '60s, did about 300 different forms. This would probably have been done circa 1960s. We see often Modernist, simple, fun designs, but they're often on plates.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: This is so crazy. The horns come off. They're just in there perfectly. It's not like... This is not a mistake. But he thought of this.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: "Let's put horns, and let's just have them loose," which is so bizarre.
GUEST: (chuckles)
APPRAISER: And then you can see on the bottom, it says here "Original edition from Jean Cocteau, Studio Madeline-Jolly," and six out of ten. Marie Madeline Jolly and also Philippe Jolly, the two of them, were artists and had this ceramic studio. They were in Villefranche in France. This is a very small edition.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: But this is the first time I've seen this particular one. Picasso editions are often much bigger.
GUEST: He made, like, a first one, and they made more of it?
APPRAISER: That is what happened in Madoura with Picasso.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: He made the, the first one and then there were artists...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: ...there that made the other ones.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: I don't see Cocteau there making every piece by hand.
GUEST: Okay, mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: So I would think that he made the prototypes...
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: ...and then somebody was, was doing them after. Prints and editions are very frothy right now.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: If we were to put this at auction-- though it is an edition-- easily we would put this in at $10,000 to $15,000.
GUEST: (laughing) Sorry. That's fun... (laughs) ...for an ugly vase. Perfect. Wonderful, thank you. Very good.
