Decorative Art

A charity antiques fair in aid of a Kent hospice will run at the Skinners School in Tunbridge Wells on Sunday, April 28.

Providing a stern test of the resolve of cricket enthusiasts, a Victorian loving cup was the unexpected star of Michael J Bowman’s (17.5% buyer’s premium) sale at Chudleigh.

MADAM – Inspired by the feature in ATG No 2384 about the little-known Girl-on-a-Horse English ceramic factory [also known as Compass factory], perhaps I could offer your readers another puzzle.

Having produced only 700-800 works in his short-lived career, Gilbert Marks (1861-1905) is not among the best-known silversmiths of his generation but was considered one of the foremost craftsmen of his day.

European Art glass by Gallé, Daum and Lalique from a Los Angeles collection features in Treadway Gallery’s 20th Century Art and Design auction on April 7 in Cincinnati.

Offered for £18,000, a pair of Chelsea baluster shaped vases were one of the highlight sales at Albert Amor’s show of Chelsea Gold Anchor period work from a private collection.

Iconic names in the worlds of glass and ceramics starred in Kingham & Orme’s (20% buyer’s premium) wide-ranging March 1 sale at Evesham.

Thousands of items are available to buy from dealers online. Here we pick out one that caught our eye this week.

Three models from an English porcelain factory about which almost nothing is known surfaced for sale in East Sussex last week.

MADAM – It was good to see Clarice Cliff featured in ATG No 2383. As mentioned, the pottery has had its ups and downs over the years and in any case ‘Clarice’ has always been a little ‘Marmite’.

A month before the emergence of three Compass factory figures in Lewes, the eighth and ninth recorded pieces by America’s earliest-known porcelain maker were offered for sale in Salisbury.

A massive 3ft (92cm) high majolica urn – a riot of grotesque masks, mythical figures and other motifs drawn from Renaissance sources – combining the talents of two key figures in the history of the Minton factory was included in Fonsie Mealy’s (20% buyer’s premium) sale on March 5.

The ceramics sale at Woolley & Wallis in Salisbury on April 30 includes two maiolica apothecary jars and covers from the celebrated Fortuna series – an ambitious suite of pharmacy jars and jugs made in the third quarter of the 16th century.

The March Fine Sale at Keys in Aylsham, the first since a management buyout, includes both a group of Lowestoft rarities and pieces by other factories.

If the 1970s and 80s are remembered as a heyday of English porcelain collecting it is because of enthusiasts such as Dr Dennis G Rice.

This 1750s Vincennes porcelain bottle cooler is part of a collection of around 60 lots of French, (mainly Sèvres, Vincennes and Mennecy) porcelain from the estate of the film and television executive John F Ball to be sold by Butterscotch Auctions, in Bedford, New York, on March 30-31.

This pair of plates, one of them extensively damaged and riveted, proved much more popular than predicted in a sale held in Carmarthen by Peter Francis (20% buyer’s premium) last month.

Designer and decorator Serge Royaux 1924-2016, whose collection of paintings, drawings, furniture and decorative items is being sold by Christie’s Paris rooms on April 17, liked to entertain and to arrange the decor of his table settings to suit individual guests.