NEW YORK, NY.- Phillips de Pury & Company announces its spring Design auction to be held at 450 Park Avenue on May 25. The auction comprises 176 lots of 20th century and contemporary design, on view to the public at 450 Park Avenue from May 19 to May 24. The sale will include a large group of British, American and Japanese ceramics by 20th-century masters and contemporary potters. Works include porcelain and stoneware vessels by British studio greats Lucie Rie and Hans Coper, friends and former colleagues, whose concurrent careers represent a crowning achievement in 20th-century ceramics. The auction will also include postwar and contemporary Japanese ceramic sculpture by renowned artists Sueharu Fukami, Osamu Suzuki and Kazuo Yagi, among others. By turning away from canonical forms—tea-ware, rice cups, bowls—these ceramicists questioned the functionality of pots and subordinated craft