Auctioneers

The July sales of Asian art will be notable for bringing two newly discovered pieces to the market, one in London and the other in Salisbury.

London turned up the heat in the market for Contemporary art when both Sotheby’s and Christie’s achieved outstanding results at their June evening sales.

Moorcroft miniatures are a collecting field in their own right. Anyone who owns a copy of Paul Atterbury’s book Moorcroft will be aware from the sleeve illustration just how many of the factory patterns were produced in miniature, often requiring an extra delicacy of touch on the part of the designer, potter and decorator.

IT was a family occasion on Friday June 9 at Bonhams when chairman Robert Brooks invited his father Bill to unveil a plaque for the lecture theatre in their Bond Street HQ in front of a small gathering of family members and senior staff from the auction house.

YOU wait forever then two come along at once. The sentiment so often expressed about London buses could equally well apply to rare early 18th century Continental porcelain teapots.

Following an extensive regional review, Sotheby’s are to close a number of their high street consignment offices.

The natural desire of a woman to wear the dress of her dreams on her wedding day may be an element of vanity even a Quaker bride cannot completely suppress.

THE undoubted high point of Christie’s King Street’s (20/12% buyer’s premium) single-owner sale on April 22 was the Italian equestrian bronze group of Carlo Emanuele I, Duke of Savoy pictured right.

The Yorkshire Dales, have proved a happy hunting ground for Tennants when it comes to selling classic cars and motorbikes.

NEWLY refurbished rooms at Send in Surrey mean that Ewbanks will now be able to hold two general sales a month (on the first and third Thursdays) with quarterly sales of fine art and antiques.

ENGLISH POTTERY SALESTHE products of the Staffordshire potteries from blue-printed tablewares to cottage chimney ornaments and Toby jugs to ironstone services, were the subject of a 356-lot sale at Bonhams’ Knightsbridge (20/12% buyer’s premium) back on May 11.

Christie’s New York are selling the Bibliotheca Bibliographica Breslaueriana in three portions.

The specialist British sale held by Spink (15% buyer’s premium) on May 5 consisted exclusively of the collection formed by Samuel King.

Following the decision of Thames Valley estate agents Simmons and Son to concentrate upon their core business, a new firm of fine art auctioneers and valuers has been established in Watlington.

RACEHORSE trainers may be used to a photo finish but a battle between two famous breeders went right to the wire on May 17 when Graham Budd (17.5% buyer’s premium) in association with Sotheby’s Olympia offered a selection of chattels from Ascot Racecourse.

PERHAPS the rarest of all Beswick’s ouput is the Spirit of Whitfield.

THE reputation established by Gardiner Houlgate over the last ten years for Clarice Cliff pottery has resulted in two specialist sales each year of around 200 lots.

Christie’s South Kensington (20/12% buyer’s premium) : Art Nouveau and Art DecoThis two-day, all-Continental offering really was a sale of two halves.

AFTER the mixed response to the Christopher Dresser material offered at Lyon & Turnbull (Buyers Premium 17.5%), it was left to the catalogue of decorative arts, consigned by various vendors, to provide the auctioneers with their biggest number of the day.

François Pinault, the French business tycoon who owns Christie’s, has abandoned his plans to build a £100m museum near Paris to house his Contemporary art collection.