Decorative Art

JAMES Sillett was a jobbing artist from the Norwich School of painters, who worked on a broad spectrum of projects including heraldic painting and stage scene decoration, but he is best known as a competent miniaturist.

COMPETING against the likes of Carlton Ware and Crown Ducal for market share, cheerful mass-produced ceramics were what the prolific Fieldings Crown Devon factory did best. The best of the second best, if you like.

THE ebullient Samuel Boscher (16.74% buyer’s premium) was in typically sonorous form for his annual two-day summer jamboree in Cherbourg on August 8/9.

PEWTER always forms the first section of Bonhams’ (17.5/10% buyer's premium) oak sales at Chester, and on September 9 enthusiasts, mainly collectors, were there as usual. Most had their eyes on the obvious star offering, the fine Charles II wriggle-work tankard, top right.

ALTHOUGH many vendors decided to hold back some of their best furniture and paintings for the autumn sales, there was enough in Brightwell's (15% buyer's premium) 1266-lot August 11-12 outing to attract holidaymakers as well as some dealers who had not visited Brightwells for some time. As a result, it boasted a healthy 85 per cent take-up by lot and a total of £90,000.

RIGHT: offered as the final lot of the day, this 21oz Guild of Handicrafts silver and enamel comport proved to be one of the stars of Clarke Gammon Wellers’ sale on September 7.

TO one side of this 4.75in (12cm) high early 19th century lustre and transfer printed jug are the legends No Corn Bill, Universal Suffrage, Annual Parliaments and Vote by Ballot.

IT may have been the peak of the summer holiday season, but it was business as usual at Mallams (15% buyer's premium) Gloucestershire rooms when the 515-lot sale on August 19 totalled in the region of £70,000.

MONMOUTH dealer Nick Wheatley – a specialist in Arts & Crafts, as the name of his shop Our House 1860-1925, at 6-8 St. James Street, implies – has also beeen building up for a show.

DERBYSHIRE dealer and now organiser, Nicholas Gent started Prestige Ceramics Fairs last June when he took over the London Ceramics Fair at the Lancaster Gate Thistle Hotel from veteran specialist fairs promoter Fred Hynds. He will be back in the capital next January, but, in the meantime, he launches a new event nearer home with the first Derbyshire Ceramics Fair at the Cavendish Hall, Chatsworth on October 9 and 10.

ONE of 11, generally very fine, British drinking glasses consigned from ‘a Highland lady’ to The Scottish Sale held by Bonhams (17.5% buyer's premium) in Edinburgh on August 18-20, was this 3 1/4in (8cm) high polychromed enamel firing glass, right, probably decorated c.1765 by member of the Beilby family of Newcastle.

WITH only eight of the 300 lots bringing four-figure sums, the Mallams (15% buyer's premium) sale on August 25 was a fairly sleepy summer affair by usual standards at Oxford, but there were pieces of interest throughout for budget-conscious bidders.

ALTHOUGH the 616-lot sale held by Thomson, Roddick & Medcalf (15% buyer’s premium) in Edinburgh took place back on June 23, the sale highlight merits recording. This was the finely worked silver gilt globe cup, right, probably made in Germany.

GEORGE Jensen silver specialists The Silver Fund, who have shops in St. James’s, London and Madison Avenue, New York, have opened an outlet at Gump’s, San Francisco’s leading department store.

WHILE Brian Haughton celebrates the botanical beauties of fine Chelsea, an altogether more prosaic, but nonetheless interesting, ceramic encounter is under scrutiny in Kensington Church Street.

SOME provincial auctioneers and London’s major houses batten down their hatches during the traditionally dead month of August, but for Scarborough Perry (15% buyer's premium) it was business as usual for their August 12-13 sale.

INNOVATIVE Oxfordshire dealers The Country Seat may be best known as furniture specialists, but they are increasingly turning their focus towards 19th and 20th century design.

HERTFORDSHIRE organiser Paul Bishop, who founded Oxbridge Fairs to mount specialist glass events, holds his fourth Cambridge Glass Fair at Chilford Hall Vineyard, Linton, Cambridgeshire this Sunday (September 12) and, with 100 tables, it is fully booked.

MIDDLESBROUGH specialist in Moorcroft, Carlton Ware and Linthorpe pottery Jim Shaw, better known as Appleton Antiques, has given up his stands at the Red House Antiques Centre, York and The Ginnel, Harrogate, although he keeps a toehold in the latter, renting a cabinet.

THE biggest surprise in the July 17 sale held by Skinners of Boston was provided by a pair of Chinese chairs, but the pair of 3 7/8in (10cm) high, Wedgwood & Bentley blue jasper portrait medallions of c.1779 right, depicting William Penn & Benjamin Franklin, also did well.