Auctioneers

Just occasionally it doesn’t always pay to catalogue with great depth.

Bid to £1.35m at Christie’s (25/20/12.5% buyer’s premium) this summer, as part of a ‘Classic Week’ evening sale of paintings, drawings, manuscripts, sculpture and decorative arts of all ages, was a lavishly illustrated Book of Hours attributed to the Master of the Monypenny Breviary and associates.

Choice specimens of the rarest English coins are reaching new financial territory.

Economic stimulus packages are not a new phenomenon. Georg Siegmund Stobwasser (1717-76) was among the many craftsmen attracted to the Brunswick by the special privileges granted them in the city by Duke Karl I (1713-80) in the wake of the Seven Years’ War.

Christo (1935-2020) is famous for the series of monumental projects to wrap landmarks around the world undertaken with his wife and collaborator Jeanne-Claude (1935-2008).

A Beatles-themed sale held by Cato Crane (28% buyer’s premium) in Liverpool last month included architectural souvenirs from St Peter’s Church in Woolton.

A notable of feature of the Post-War and Contemporary art market is the wide variety of mediums employed.

The works of French painter André Masson (1896-1987) are regarded as a bridge between Surrealism and Abstract Expressionism.

Launched in 1956, La Biennale des Antiquaires, now an annual event known as La Biennale Paris, is one of the world’s longest-established and best-known art and antiques fairs.

The allure of well-priced, market-fresh chattels from a blue-blood country estate can pique the interest of the most world-weary auctioneer or antiques dealer.

Inscribed copies of the works of Dodie Smith were among the attractions of a summer sale held by Stride & Son (18% buyer’s premium) of Chichester.

Interest from overseas bidders appears to be lifting the market for Banksy (b.1974) prints to a higher level.

Coinex, the traditional autumn focus for the numismatic world, is cancelled this year.

A Military Cross group awarded to a soldier who carried a fallen comrade through fierce gunfire in Iraq sold at £36,000 (plus 20% buyer ’s premium) in Macclesfield on September 11.

This 9in (23cm) Qing blue and white porcelain bowl decorated in underglaze blue with squirrels in fruiting bears a Qianlong (1736-95) six-character seal mark and is probably of the period.

A work on paper by Czech artist Mikulas Medek (1926- 1971) drew strong competition at Chiswick Auctions’ (25% buyer’s premium) latest British & European Fine Art sale.