Print Edition

A new art fair launching at the Saatchi Gallery this June is a late addition to the busy schedule of London’s summer art events.

Underpinned by bids from the internet, silver from beyond the British Isles is these days a stronger feature of provincial sales.

A 1782 first of James Stewart’s 'Plocacosmos: or, the Whole Art of Hair Dressing' illustrated with 10 plates showing hairstyles was offered as part of a Forum Auctions sale.

Researching Old Master paintings is sometimes likened to putting together the pieces of a jigsaw. But for one upcoming work, it seems this was quite literally the case.

Dealer Andrew Sim has sold 14 Second World War pictures by Polish-born artist Feliks Topolski (1907-89) to the Imperial War Museum.

A drawing offered at a Paris auction with an attribution to Italian Renaissance painter Giovanni Francesco Penni (1488-1528) was hammered down at €1.13m (£980,000).

A large oil on panel map by MacDonald Gill celebrating the presence of stationer WH Smith on the British high street in the 1920s was hammered down at £50,000 in Gloucestershire.

At the turn of the 20th century, work by Italian émigré Andrew Grima (1921-2007) or the London jeweller Kutchinsky was on the periphery of the collecting world – still languishing in the bottom of jewellery boxes or, worse, the melting pot.

Three modestly valued works selling at regional sales below £1300, including a child portrait by James Leakey (1775- 1865), an artist known best for his miniatures.

This pair of 19th century Arts & Crafts low oak chairs is available from Elaine Phillips Antiques at the next edition of The Pavilions of Harrogate Decorative Antiques & Fine Art Fair priced at £1150.

St James’s art dealer Derek Johns is offering a portrait of Sir Everard Fawkener, a former British ambassador to Constantinople, by Swiss artist Jean-Etienne Liotard (1702-89).

ATG’s weekly selection of items on sale at auctions and dealerships.

In the 1980s, the 3ft 7in x 2ft 9in (1.1m x 85cm) canvas of Saint Bartholomew being offered by Dorotheum in Vienna on April 30 was tentatively ascribed to Caravaggio. The treatment of light and shadow and the extreme naturalism in the portrayal certainly indicate a proximity to the revolutionary artist.

ATG’s selection of auction lots bought by internet bidders on thesaleroom.com from the period April 11-17, 2019. This includes both the highest prices over estimate and the top prices paid online.

Estimated at just £50-80, an Alice Davis Hitchcock medallion sold for £3000 (plus 20% buyer’s premium) at a Spink auction in London on April 10.

This trio of clocks – all classic collectors’ pieces – went well above estimate at spring sales.

Organisers looking for an unusual spot at which to hold a fair might consider the setting alongside an outdoor swimming pool.

A round-up of art and antiques news from the previous seven days, including Chiswick Auctions launching a department for cars and automobilia.