Auctions

Irish silver rarely appears at German auctions but when it does, it seldom goes unnoticed.

Collection of film crew member who worked on gruelling Star Wars shoot in Norway comes for sale

Numerous bidders at a Peter Karbstein (25% buyer’s premium) auction in Düsseldorf took a fancy to a 19th century marble statue of The Flight from Pompeii.

A hand-cranked movie camera from 1908 was one of the stars at a recent sale at Auction Team Breker (21.8% buyer’s premium) in Cologne.

The arts and crafts of colonial America are enjoying a purple patch in the market as Western institutions seek to tell the story of Latin American art in more inclusive and expansive ways

The Autumn Welsh Sale (Part II) held by Rogers Jones (24% buyer’s premium) on December 2 included an item of clothing once owned by a Welsh icon: Richard Burton (1925-84).

Expert in astronomy and history of science amassed an impressive private collection of related works

When he was not crafting lacquer works, the 18th century Japanese artist Ogawa Haritsu spent his time, painting, creating pottery and composing haiku poems.

In his workshop records for the period October 1739 to January 1740, Johann Joachim Kaendler, Meissen’s most accomplished modeller, noted his creation of a “life-sized jay sitting on a trunk, naturally depicted, next to him is a life-sized squirrel seated on a branch, modelled in clay, along with other appropriate ornamentation”.

The first day of the December 10-12 sale at Adam Partridge in Macclesfield, Cheshire, included a 2in (5cm) high Fabergé jewelled agate model of a cockerel or rooster.

So-called ‘talc pictures’ or ‘metamorphoses’ were fashionable amusements in European courts in the second half of the 17th century.

The combination of a master cabinetmaker, a good provenance and a modest estimate made a prolonged bidding match for a late 18th century writing desk more or less inevitable.

Sales ranging from enamel signs to petroliana and breweriana generate a booming market

A first edition, first issue of the Great ‘He’ Bible sold in York for £23,000 hammer was bought by Norfolk book dealer Simon Finch, it has emerged.

Bizarrely, Ralph Fremlin – a devout Christian who founded Fremlin’s Brewery in Maidstone, Kent, in 1861 – was anti-drinking.

Our regular listing of books and works on paper sales