Fine Art

This small watercolour by Irish artist Mildred Anne Butler (1858-1941) titled 'The Garden, Kilkenny' sold for an unexpected £2500 at Wessex Auction Rooms (17% buyer’s premium) in Chippenham.

With much of Europe retreating once again into lockdown, two French galleries are offering a window on the world with a retrospective of the well-travelled artist Jacques Martin-Ferrières (1893-1972).

A painting by an English artist but with a Scottish subject drew attention at the latest Modern Made auction held by Lyon & Turnbull (25% buyer’s premium).

‘Miseries of Travelling’ is one of the 50 hand-coloured plates that make up an 1808 first edition of Thomas Rowlandson’s 'Miseries of Human Life' – in this instance “Unpacking up your clothes for a journey because your servant is a fool…”.

Artcurial’s latest staging of its biannual sales of Old Master and 19th century paintings, drawings and sculpture will take place on November 18 as a live, behind-closed-doors auction at the firm’s Paris rooms.

The latest evening sales of Impressionist & Modern and Contemporary art held at Sotheby’s (25/20/13.9 buyer’s premium + 1% overhead premium) in New York produced very high-selling rates but they were somewhat slimmer affairs than the normal run of sales in this category.

Leonard Squirrell (1893-1979) is most associated with East Anglia, producing a significant body of rural scenes of Suffolk and Norfolk as well as cityscapes of Norwich and Ipswich.

British artist Edith Lawrence (1890-1973) was known for her paintings, linocuts and textile designs, but was somewhat overshadowed in her lifetime by her husband, fellow artist Claude Flight (1881-1955).

Exhibition of the Mod Brit artist’s works concentrates on the second part of his career

In the 1620s, Sebastian Vrancx was among the most prominent painters working in Antwerp. He was famed for his landscapes and village scenes, but was also renowned for his often drastically detailed depictions of battles.

Derek Newman is a specialist dealer in 18th-20th century watercolours and drawings. His annual exhibition of 18th-20th century British watercolours runs from November 12-15.

Early depictions of some of the most famous racehorses of their day lead the field

Swiss-born artist Samuel Hieronymus Grimm (1733-94) completed his watercolour of The Berkshire House in Putney in 1772 after arriving in London four years earlier.

On November 18 Van Ham in Cologne will hold a Decorative Art auction which will include several more items from the collection of Thomas Olbricht.

A tragic shipwreck provided the Danish marine painter Anton Melbye and his colleague John William Bottomley, a German of Irish origin, with a dramatic subject for their 2ft x 2ft 11in (60 x 90cm) oil painting The Wreck of the Anglo Saxon from 1863.

Relatively little is known about the 19th century woodcarver Francesco Toso, who was born in Murano, Venice, to a family of glass makers.

For the second time in as many sales, Sworders’ (25% buyer’s premium) 20th Century Design auction on October 13 included a ‘microgauze’ wall hanging by the British artist-weaver Peter Collingwood (1922-2008).

The Decades of Design sale at Fieldings (24% buyer’s premium inc VAT) in Stourbridge on October 15-16 included 52 works from the family of Albert Wainwright (1898-1943). He was a Castleford artist who trained at the Leeds School of Art in 1914.