Fine Art

More than 400 online enquiries came through the 'London Art Week' (LAW) website during its preview day last Thursday as it kicked off a new virtual format.

This pastel by the Barbizon school artist Jean-François Millet (1814-75) is one of the highlights in the Esprit du XIXème Siècle auction at Osenat in Fontainebleau on July 19.

Consignments from vendors with a close connection to famous artists are always a welcome boon for any auction.

A new catalogue on painter-etcher Michael Blaker (1929-2018) includes a picture he executed of one of his friends as well as an etching by her.

Without the signature and dedication, this crayon and pencil drawing of 'Dorfhaus mit Baum und Randsteinen' (Village House with Tree and Rocks), coming up for sale at Neumeister in Munich on July 16, would be virtually impossible to attribute to its creator.

This 8 x 10in (21 x 25cm) oil on canvas board sketch of two farmhands cutting grasses with a scythe is unsigned but it carries a label on the back from an Ipswich Borough Council exhibition which identifies the artist as Harry Becker (1865-1928) and the picture’s title as Fieldworkers in Mid-Summer.

A 1913 still life painted by Italian modernist Alberto Magnelli (1888- 1971) early in his career and a magazine holder of stitched leather and brass, c.1955, by French designer Jacques Adnet (1900-84) are among the works offered at M&L Fine Art’s post-lockdown show 'Close Quarters'.

The sale of Selected Works at Grisebach in Berlin includes this early photographic view of Paris, taken in the 1850s by Gustave Le Gray.

‘Freshness and sensible estimates’ contribute to record 5016 registrants for Macclesfield sale.

Rebecca Eames runs Eames Fine Art, which currently hosts an exhibition on Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore in its south London premises.

A trio of oils by Venetian artist Antonio Ermolao Paoletti (1834-1912) were consigned to Dawsons (23% buyer’s premium) of Maidenhead from a private London collection.

Two very different Japanese works on paper performed with equal gusto at Sworders’ (25% buyer’s premium) recent Asian art sale, both making 10-times-estimate sums for a vendor from Hertfordshire.

Edvard Munch returned to the subject 'Woman in Moonlight – The Voice' on several occasions.

It is thought that the German artist Adelheid Dietrich (1827-91), renowned for her incredibly detailed still-lifes of fruit and flowers, completed only 50 paintings during her career.

Vienna saleroom Dorotheum (28/25/22/18% buyer’s premium) was hoping to send a positive signal for the art market from its latest Old Master sale.

For 300 years, from the 1520s to the 1820s, the great Gothic cathedral in Cologne remained unfinished – the building overshadowed by a large crane, which for centuries dominated the panorama on the banks of the Rhine.

The stand-out lot at David Lay’s latest Cornish art sale was an oil by Dod Procter (1891-1972), a leading member of the colony of avant garde artists working in Cornwall in the 1920s-30s.