Auctioneers

A major draw to a recent Dreweatts’ (25% buyer’s premium) sale of Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art was a cache of Qing porcelain and hardstone carvings previously owned by Anthony de Rothschild (1887-1961).

The record-setting piece of Beswick pottery at a recent sale at Potteries Auctions (20% buyer’s premium) – a rare variant of a shire horse model that fetched £11,300 (ATG No 2569) – was not the only lot bringing notable demand.

Dreweatts’ (25% buyer’s premium) ‘part II’ sale of Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art at the end of last year included Chinese export porcelain from ‘the china store of a Somerset country house’.

By illustrating and combining popular folk songs with scenes of dramas of the time, the artist or workshop named Ding Liangxian created a new type of woodblock print for urban Chinese audiences in the second quarter of the 18th century.

Despite a few surprises among the lots at Rogers Jones’ (24% buyer’s premium) third and final Welsh Sale of 2022, the solid performance of at least one of the leading pictures was probably more expected.

Highlights including signed opera score from a varied auction held in North Yorkshire

One of four works as commission for the Polish king is the star lot of an Austrian collection

A round-up of art and antiques news from the previous seven days, including an 18th century Kyoto carving setting an auction record at Bonhams for any netsuke.

The Rokujuyoshu Meisho Zue (Famous Views of the Sixty-odd Provinces) series was the last great landscape work created by Japanese ukiyo-e artist Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858).

Antiques dealer and taxidermy specialist Emma Hawkins is selling a collection from her townhouses in Edinburgh and London at Sotheby’s this month.

The Komai family of sword makers and armourers were among the many Japanese metalworkers courting a new clientele during the Meiji period (1868-1912).

Although Dutchmen John and David Elers came to London sometime in the 1680s as silversmiths, the brothers are remembered today as the potters who brought fine unglazed stonewares to Staffordshire.

The sale at Kinghams (23% buyer’s premium) in Moreton-in-Marsh included a 12in (30cm) carved cinnabar lacquer dish dating from the late Yuan or early Ming period – c.1350-1400.

A large reticulated ‘dragon and phoenix’ censer came for sale at Mallams’ (25% buyer’s premium) in Cheltenham from a Herefordshire vendor whose family had lived in Shanghai in the 1930s.

Neolithic jade congs – the inspiration for many pieces of Qing and later porcelain – are probably some of the most intriguing objects from ancient Chinese culture.

Vietnamese buyers have sent the best works of art from the Le (1428-1789) and Nguyen (1802-1945) dynasties to unchartered territory in recent years.

“We have been to the Pole and we shall die like gentlemen.”

Creative examples featured in recent UK auctions show the influence of religion and culture on the Manchu rulers of the Qing