Hans Coper's last body of work is collectively known as the 'Cycladic' series and each distinctive form in the series would have no more than four or five examples. This particular bud pot, a globular form rising on a funnel-shaped stem from a cubic base, was one of the very last in this series and few known examples exist. Other recorded bud pots have a white globular form on a black square base and a black form on a grey-green base; here both top and base are glazed a burnished, graphite-like black.

This last series is now generally regarded as a culmination and refinement of everything that Coper had achieved in his career, as Tony Birks describes,

'In this breathtaking collection Hans seems to have carried to the ultimate the purity of form that he had been seeking for so long. The new pots, though small, seem to concentrate energy and to be denser than anything natural. Hans had pursued Mies van de Rohe's maxim, Less means More, and produced his finest forms.' 1

Coper left barely any written records, but he did write a brief introduction to the catalogue of 1969 exhibition at the V&A, in which he explains his approach to his work,

'My concern is with extracting essence rather than with experiment and exploration, the wheel imposes its economy, dictates limits, provides momentum and continuity.

Concentrating on continuous variations of simple themes I become part of the process; I am learning to operate a sensitive instrument which may be resonant to my experience of existence now - in this fantastic century. Practising a craft with ambiguous reference to purpose and function one has occasion to face absurdity. More than anything, somewhat like a demented piano-tuner, one is trying to approximate a phantom pitch. One is apt to take refuge in pseudo-principles which crumble. Still, the routine of work remains. One deals with the facts.'

1 Tony Birks, Hans Coper, Marston House, Yeovil, 2005, p71