News

SCALE models of racing cars, and scratch-built models of engine components may not be typical stock for antique dealers but in a very special collectables niche market they enjoy a keen following as was clearly demonstrated by a sell-out sale, held at Christie’s South Kensington (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) last month.

Funded by the Friends of the British Museum, the Caryatid Fund and the National Art Collections Fund, the British Museum has acquired an extremely rare Roman fluorspar cup from the 1st century AD. The total cost of the antiquity, bought from a leading London dealer, was £150,000.

MUCH of the saleroom activity in London over the past month has been of a fairly low key nature – routine sales of furnishings and objects. However, routine needn’t mean unsuccessful. Sales held at this traditionally thinly served period of the auction year can yield strong results, as customers home in on what little is around in the Capital. In the middle of the month, from January 13-15, Christie’s South Kensington held the first of their At Home weeks for 2004.

FRANCE: THE centenary of the Wiener Werkstätte, founded by Josef Hoffmann and Koloman Moser in 1903, was commemorated in Vienna with various museum and gallery exhibitions, and two specialist auctions at the city’s main auction houses – the Dorotheum and Wiener Kunst.

TALISMAN Fairs would like to point out that they are pressing ahead with all their dates in both Bristol and Bath.

Pictures and furniture were the commodities in demand at a busy Tatton Park Fair which Robert Bailey held from January 9 to 11. The Essex organiser regularly tends to pick up quite a bit of business at this early-year venue.

The pre-Christmas horological sales were lower key than those traditionally seen in the London rooms at this time of year. With the continuing problem of sourcing enough good material, few top names were on offer to tempt the serious collector, and the general mixed sales which resulted provided some good-value purchases for buyers further down the scale.