Avant-garde ceramics – made in the 19th and early 20th century by four siblings who lived in poverty – are back under the hammer

Eccentric ceramics made by the four Martin brothers, who lived and worked in near poverty in London in the late 19th century, are now highly prized by collectors. This month an unusual bird jar, originally made to store tobacco and typical of their surreal style, is expected to sell for up to £50,000 at a Salisbury auction house, despite the fact that it is just a few inches high.

In 1873 the brothers – Robert Wallace, Walter, Edwin and Charles – began their strange 50-year creative journey when they first fired up a kiln inside the family home. Four years later they moved into a disused soap works in Southall and together created an avant-garde cast of varied ceramic characters and animals, each made and sold as mugs, jugs, jars, vases and spoon-warmers. The brothers could only afford to fire the kiln once or twice a year, and had no money to pay for protective containers to keep the pots safe during firing.

Eventually their reputation grew, but as Robert Wallace, the eldest, complained later in 1910, “my brothers and myself never got more than a labourer’s wages”.

The Pre-Raphaelite painters Edward Burne-Jones and Dante Gabriel Rosetti became avid collectors, and in 1914 Queen Mary ordered 60 pieces of Martinware to be exhibited at the Paris Exposition.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Three of the Martin brothers creating their eccentric menagerie of pottery. Photograph: Historical Picture Archive/Corbis via Getty Images

But by 1921, when Robert Wallace watched agog at Sotheby’s auction house as a single bird jar sold at the high price of £50, he was the only brother left alive. The Martin’s shop had burnt down, taking much of their stock with it, and reportedly robbing Charles of his sanity. Walter was killed by a cerebral haemorrhage in 1912. It was caused by a blood clot that formed in his arm three months earlier when he knocked his elbow while unpacking the kiln. Edwin died of cancer in 1915.

In 1978, London dealer Richard Dennis sparked a new interest in Martinware when he staged a key exhibition, The Martin Brothers Potters, at Sotheby’s Belgravia. This was followed by a landmark New York exhibition in 1981 exalting in the unlikely title Boobies, Boojums and Snarks.

“It recreated the interior of the Martin Brothers’ shop and introduced a whole new generation of Americans to the Wally bird tobacco jars, satyr-mask jugs, spoon-warmers and other gothic delights,” said Michael Jeffery, head of design at Salisbury auctioneers, Woolley & Wallis. “The market for these wares has been on the rise ever since, and when you see the craftsmanship and imagination that has gone into them it is easy to understand why.”

Five years ago,Woolley & Wallis sold a jar for a record £75,000, while the British government has just put an export bar on another, recently sold for £200,000, because many of the brothers’ works are now seen as national treasures. The auction is on 27 November at Woolley & Wallis.