Auctioneers

The latest flagship sales of Modern and Contemporary art in New York showed a return to some normality after a difficult 14 months.

Duke’s sale of property from Wormington Grange in Gloucestershire included a record for the Modern British painter Algernon Newton (1880-1968).

The first of two Bonhams sales dispersing the remaining stock of the long-established Chinese art dealership of Roger Keverne was a marathon affair.

Estimated at just £80-150, a Queen Anne or George I period needlework sampler sold for £10,000 via thesaleroom.com at Lawrences (25% buyer’s premium) of Crewkerne.

A rare watch worn by Pablo Picasso will feature as one of the attractions in the Luxury Watch sale to be held by Bonhams in Paris on May 20.

Second sale since auction house move and name change is a British art pottery success

A week after Kinghams’ (23% buyer’s premium) inaugural Moreton-in-Marsh sale of British art pottery, the new Cotswolds rooms enjoyed a big hit in miniature – more specifically this portrait by one of Britain’s greatest miniaturists: John Smart (1743-1811).

Even 40 years ago, when the market for George Tinworth (1843-1913) anthropomorphic mouse groups was in its relative infancy, this 3½in (9cm) model above would have been a bargain at £1.

Intended to keep servants warm in the draughty watches of day and night at the entrances to grand houses, this porter’s chair was bought at Christie’s in 1989 and used in the vendor’s living room ever since.

A double-gourd dragon vase was one of two excellent Chinese pieces to emerge from a deceased Hampshire estate into Selborne auction house Hannam’s (23% buyer’s premium) rooms on May 4.

The highlight of a sale of paintings, furniture and works of art staged at Drouot by Coutau-Bégarie on May 28 will be this early 16th century Limoges enamel plaque painted with a scene from Virgil’s Aeneid.

Works from either a distinguished collection or well-known owner offered with appealing estimates are an enticing prospect at auction.

François Pompon auction record leads a look at four stand-out results achieved in the French capital

Bid to £2000 at Dominic Winter (20% buyer’s premium) was a 1712 first of Francis Bragge’s 'Witchcraft Farther Display’d', a rare work that opens with an account of the case of Jane Wenham – the last woman to be condemned for witchcraft in England.

A couple of Winston Churchill letters were among the more successful lots in a second selection from a History in Manuscript collection* formed over the last 20 years and offered at Sotheby’s (26/20/13.9% buyer’s premium).

As the son of an entomologist and ornithologist, the artist David Morrison Reid-Henry (1919-77) was destined for a career observing wildlife and nature.

Good art at a great price in regional sales.

This Fijian kava bowl, or daveniyaqona, carved in the form of a shallow figure, would have been used for both the consumption of kava (yaqona – the intoxicating liquor of the pepper plant) by priests during religious rites and to hold sacred oil.