News topics

The primary contents of North Mymms Park in Hertfordshire – including an important collection of European tapestries – provided Sworders with its best-ever sale last week.

A New York law banning the sale of antique ivory has been challenged in court by two leading US antiques dealers associations.

The online art market’s growth is slowing but the use of mobile phones to buy art continues to increase.

Avon and Somerset police are appealing for information after a raid on the Museum of East Asian Art in Bath.

Characterised by high-quality craftsmanship, a bold use of colour plus a love of whimsy, the menagerie of gem-set or enamel animal designs are particularly recognisable as signature Kutchinsky pieces.

A remarkable collection of around 4500 postcards relating to a wide range of aspects of Jewish life in the 19th and 20th centuries was the fascinating, and often sobering, centre of interest when offered by Norfolk auction house Horners (17% buyer’s premium).

LS Lowry’s industrial northern English city scenes, populated with his trademark ‘matchstick’ figures, have inspired many artists. Chief among them was Brian ‘Braaq’ Shields (1951-97), dubbed ‘Liverpool’s Lowry’.

Sold for $300,000 (£214,185) apiece in a recent New York sale were three very well-known works from the worlds of cartography and natural history.

MADAM – Thank you for printing my previous correspondence (ATG No 2337). If I thought that a ban on pre-1947 ivory would stop the death of 50 elephants I would stop writing.

A hand-coloured design for Charles Voysey’s 'River Rug' surfaced at Lawrences of Crewkerne where it sold at £21,000 (plus premium).

On song at Stratford-upon-Avon, a late 19th century French automaton musical bird soared beyond the £1000-1500 estimate at Bigwood (19% buyer’s premium).

Unlike other European jewellers, where designers and makers were often shrouded in anonymity, the Georg Jensen Co promoted its craftspeople and encouraged them to become names in their own right.

This hyper-realist oil on canvas 'Orlando Furioso' was painted by Pierre Peyrolle in 1996 and is one of the collection of pictures by the artist included in La Profondeur de l’Artifice, the first exhibition for the French artist in the UK. It runs at the Tomasso Brothers’ London gallery until May 11.

On April 28 the Bordeaux auction house Briscadieu is holding a sale devoted to Peintures Bordelaises – featuring scenes by a mix of local artists and those from further afield who visited this picturesque region. An idea started in 2015, this is the auctioneers’ third such themed sale.