News

GOOD news for all those British dealers who are anxious to attend a fair in New York sooner rather than later. Back in February, David Lester, head of International Fine Art Expositions, organisers of the acclaimed Palm Beach fair, announced he was planning an autumn fair at Manhattan’s Jacob Javits Convention Center.

Sir John Lavery R.A. (1856-1941) is one of the hottest names in the booming Irish picture market and back in 1998 The Bridge at Grez, a large oil on canvas, took a record £1.3m at Christie’s London.

FOLLOWING the cancellation of Salon de Mars 2002 owing to a dispute with the venue over a clash with other fixtures, its organisers Association ARES have dissolved and Salon de Mars is no more.

THE jewellery and vertu at Tennants’ sale was led by a pair of 2ct diamond ear studs at £9200 but more eye-catching among the vertu was this forerunner of the Swiss Army knife, right.

Clarice Cliff: The latest auction foray into the colourful world of Clarice Cliff at Christie’s South Kensington (17.5/10% buyer’s premium), May 2, did not perform as well as previous specialist sales. Buyers were only found for 62 per cent of the 302 lots compared to their last Clarice Cliff outing in November 2001 that boasted a higher 72 per cent take-up for the 430 lots.

Furniture and pictures can usually be relied upon to bag the biggest prices in provincial auctions but while this was so at Bristol Auction Rooms April sale there were also interesting works in some of the other sections.

The late Clive Sherwood bought this imposing Elizabethan oak tester bed at Sotheby’s in London in 1969. By all accounts he had to sell all his silver to raise the cash, but he was still buying early oak at a time when it was possible to buy in bulk and learn from your mistakes.