Auctioneers

A philosopher of mathematics, the human consciousness and language, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) was described by his teacher Bertrand Russell as “the most perfect example I have ever known of genius as traditionally conceived”.

In a category of its own – and bringing one of the highest prices at the Tennants autumn sale – was a brass, tooth-edge dog collar engraved Rt. Honble Lord Byron.

Described as the ‘Proustian Holy Grail’ by Sotheby’s Paris (25/20/12.5% buyer’s premium), one of just five special copies printed on Japanese paper of Marcel Proust’s Du côté de chez Swann sold for a premium-inclusive €535,000 (£471,780) in a sale of October 30.

Shapes Auctioneers based in Edinburgh is to close.

For a relatively brief period during the 19th century, small silver boxes decorated with British landmarks found an eager following among the honeymooners and day-trippers of Georgian and Victorian England.

An Old Master portrait of an elderly Stuart woman took £13,200 at Mander Auctioneers (17.5% buyer’s premium) in Suffolk on November 18.

Two big names dominated the 20th Century Decorative Arts sale held by Gildings (15% buyer’s premium) in Market Harborough on November 7.

British bee books formed an unusual feature of a November 8 sale held by Dominic Winter (19.5% buyer’s premium).

Topping a recent sale at Boulton & Cooper in Malton, near York was this unusual Georgian miniature elbow chair with shell-carved knees and cresting rail.

George Orwell is the focus of a first look at a November 7 Sotheby’s (25/20/12.5% buyer’s premium) sale of books from The Library of an English Bibliophile, the seventh in that series to have been held since 2010. Orwell’s books made a significant contribution to the overall total.

Plaudits were deserved in Paris on November 27 for Camille Claudel (1864-1943) when Artcurial’s (25/20/12% buyer’s premium) dedicated sale of 20 of the sculptor’s works were offered direct from her family.

Our weekly selection from salerooms and dealerships

If, as generally accepted, the tri-annual fine art sales at Tennants (20% buyer’s premium) can be regarded as something of a barometer of the middle market, the outlook following the autumn sale on November 18 appears rather more steady than the Brexit nervousness talked about elsewhere in the economy.

Founded three years ago, the Whitchurch, Shropshire, firm of Trevanion & Dean (19% buyer’s premium) enjoyed its best sale so far when the 950 lots, ranging from Renaissance art to contemporary glass, totalled £250,000 on November 18.

The sluggish area of Victorian genre painting provided Brightwells (20% buyer’s premium) with one of its top-sellers at the November 8-9 sale in Leominster.