Auctioneers

Landscape painter Sidney Richard Percy (1821-86) is described in Christopher Wood’s Dictionary of Victorian Painters as “a prolific and variable painter, and his prices vary accordingly”.

The personal enthusiasm of John Braund of Turpin’s Antiques, who died in January aged 90, was early oak and associated metalware.

Dix Noonan Webb (DNW) has become the first UK numismatics auction house to set its buyer’s premium beyond 20%. The London coins, medal and jewellery specialist will charge a premium of 24% from September.

Aldridges of Bath smashed its house record last week with the sale of a Yongzheng mark and period bowl for £220,000 (plus 20% buyer’s premium). It had come for sale following a routine house call.

Did a watch offered for sale in Carlisle at the end of July once belong to Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658)? Two centuries of provenance suggest it did.

Sold in the heartlands of English ceramics, this example, below, of Scotland’s finest was the estimate-shattering star of Potteries Auctions’ (20% buyer’s premium) July 13-14 sale in Stoke-on-Trent.

There’s no doubt that items from some of the ‘eureka’ moments in Victorian design are falling away from the collecting zeitgeist. The current fashion is undoubtedly towards the creative ideas of the second half of the 20th century.

Pioneering astronomical works which appeared many centuries before the moon landing sell at auction.

Under forthcoming UK ivory legislation, there will be no legitimate market for bronze and ivory Art Deco figures.

While the vast majority of works at Old Master sales are by European artists, an unusual offering at Bonhams’ sale on July 3 was a Latin American work by a painter with Afro-Caribbean ancestry.