Decorative Art

This tiled panel advertising Champagne Mercier was one of a rare ensemble of six panels made in the early 1920s, each 5ft 9in x 2ft (174 x 62cm), on offer under the Prunier hammer in Louviers (14.95% buyer’s premium) on November 17. The other tiled panels, accompanied by two landscape friezes, also advertised drinks (Rhum Negrita, St Raphaël, Guillot Triple Sec, Quenot Dijon cassis, Fine Legrand cognac), and were marked G.F.C. France for Gilardoni Fils & Compagnie of Choisy-le-Roi, near Paris.

A private collection of Wood family Staffordshire pearlware figures was the main focus of a sale of British ceramics held by Sotheby’s Olympia on November 19.

THE sale at Amersham Auction Rooms (15 per cent buyer’s premium) on October 3 had a number of items with collector appeal – none more so than this Wemyss cat, right, a speciality within a speciality. The vendors had no knowledge of the value of the 123/4in (32cm) black and grey cat but bidders at Buckinghamshire didn’t need the Wemyss Ware Made in England painted mark to the base to recognise it for what it was and the cat sold to a local dealer at £4000.

Some dealers believe that the market for plated silver has never been the same since the Italians ducked out in the mid 1990s, and while it is true that types such as entrée dishes and tureens have gone off the boil, there is still (always?) demand for candelabra, anything set with mother or pearl or ivory (American interest here) and table centrepieces like the three examples illustrated here which were offered at Bonhams Chester (buyer’s premium 17.5/10 per cent) on November 6.

In Cologne on October 26 W.G. Herr (18% buyer’s premium) staged a Jubilee sale to mark their 50th auction in the cosy Friesenwall gallery where, as he puts it, Werner Herr has been “swinging the hammer” for 20 years.

Back on October 8, Christie’s South Kensington (17.5/10% per cent buyer’s premium) held one of their periodic silver sales where the emphasis is on Scottish and Irish silver. There is a keen collector’s market for such pieces if they are unusual in some way (carrying scarce Scottish provincial marks, for example), but standard material, as with much else in the silver field, is less eagerly snapped up unless very keenly priced. So it proved here.

Wine-related silver is sitting at the top table of the market at present as the luxury boozing culture of hard-working businessmen props up the value of coasters, labels, corkscrews and funnels. But one area that has not benefited so much from the interaction of wine merchants and boardroom boys in recent years has been the standard Victorian decanter and claret jug.

There were no massed ranks of Prussian royal silver on offer at Sotheby’s Olympia (17.5/10% per cent buyer’s premium) on October 24. On offer here was a good 350-lot commercial mix of English and Continental fare from a variety of sources which netted £310,000.

THAT the Berkshire auctioneers Law Fine Art could garner more than 1000 lots, sell more than 70 per cent of them and reach a total of £160,0000 for this latest of their thrice-yearly ceramics and glass sales says as much about Mark Law’s and Nicholas Lyne’s operation as it does for the general strength of ceramics in these generally difficult times.

SHOWING until November 23 at Gary Grant’s gallery at 18 Arlington Way, London EC1, near Sadlers Wells, is a selling exhibition Post-war patterned pots which offers 110 pieces highlighting innovative designs on mid-20th century ceramics.

Studio Glass 1960-2000 by Graham McLaren, published by Shire Publications. ISBN 073780527X. £4.99sb

Thieves plagued West Country churches over the summer, stealing monumental brasses and, in one case, a misericord. Experts suspect the thefts are the work of one gang, targeting villages close to the M4 and M40. It is thought the thief must have at least one accomplice to act as lookout as several of the churches are popular with summer visitors.

AMONG a number of more positive signs for the trade this autumn, fewer are more enouraging than news of an auction house expanding to accommodate extra consigments. Such is the case at these Devon auctioneers, S.J.Hales, who, since they opened in May 2000, have held monthly auctions at the local Edgemoor Hotel where space has meant sales have not exceeded more than 800/900 almost all aimed at ceramics collectors.

Glittering personalities from the world of arts, they were the toast of Paris in the late 1960s. Capote and Sagan, Karajan and Nureyev, Callas and Saint-Laurent – their presence at soirées was coveted by the self-regarding hostesses across town, but they all paid homage to the ultimate hostess trolley when they arrived for dinner at 10 rue de Dragon.

Listings on eBay can sometimes be prone to hyperbole but when a seller from Ontario, Canada described this remarkable object as “definitely one of the finest sticking tommy candlesticks ever made” few enthusiasts of antique mining collectables could have argued.

In the same week that their South Kensington rooms offered the first instalments from Margaret Cadman’s mammoth collection Christie’s King Street (19.5/10% buyer’s premium) rooms were busy selling the second part of the Dr KH Wadsack Collection of Berlin porcelain.

EDWINA CURRIE may be the hot flavour of the month in Fleet Street, but she is hardly the toast of the Tories at the moment, and that may be the reason one of her former stalwarts has decided to part with this personal political memento.

A 221-lot auction of Contemporary Ceramics, made up the final instalment of Bonhams’ design week series on September 24. The two most bankable names in this market are Hans Coper and Lucie Rie and their work can usually be relied on to dominate the top price slots.

Charles Horner of Halifax: A Celebration of his Life and Work by Tom J Lawson, published by GML Publishing, Leicester, distributed by the Antique Collectors’ Club Ltd., Sandy Lane, Old Martlesham, Woodbridge, Suffolk IP12 4SD. ISBN 0954235401 £45hb

Novelty pieces and collector’s items like this Art Nouveau enamelled silver double-photograph locket, right, were the pieces mainly in demand at the silver and jewellery sale held by Fellows (15% buyer’s premium) at Birmingham on September 5.