Front Page and News

After a two-year wait, lots from the defunct manuscript investment scheme Aristophil will be resold at the Drouot in Paris next month.

Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi was hammered down at $400m in Christie’s post-war and contemporary art evening sale in New York on November 15.

It’s easy to feel disconnected from the hoopla surrounding Christie’s sale last week of a Leonardo da Vinci for an astronomical $400m.

Mallams in Oxford posted a house record for jewellery on November 15 when a pair of Cartier earrings sold to one of 12 international phone bidders for £72,000 (plus premium).

Bonhams capitalised on the strong market for classical Chinese furniture to set the two highest prices of the London Asian art auction series.

A dozen customers of former Surrey auction house Fryer & Brown have joined forces to pursue the firm for their goods or money owed after it ceased trading at the beginning of the year.

1stdibs has changed the way it displays objects for sale on its website.

Celebrating its 20th birthday in the British Museum’s refurbished Sir Joseph Hotung Gallery on November 9, the board of Asian Art in London was clearly proud of its achievements in promoting the city’s Asian art credentials.

The Department for International Trade (DIT) is to use its global influence to bring more art and antiques buyers to the UK.

“I died in hell – they called it Passchendaele,” Siegfried Sassoon famously wrote of the First World War carnage which ended in November 1917.

“No one can rival Thomas Cole for engraving in the 19th century,” said director Jamie South after this exhibition-quality carriage clock sold for £26,000 (plus 20% premium) at Gardiner Houlgate in Horsham, Bath, on October 25. It went to an American buyer towards the top end of the estimate.

Events to be held in tandem as IACF drops Surrey venue to focus elsewhere.

A mid-19th century scrimshaw carved whalebone walking cane sold for a house record of £17,000 (plus 18% buyer’s premium) at East Bristol Auctions on November 9.

Forum Auctions has expanded its modern and contemporary prints and editions department with two new appointments.

Sotheby’s From Earth To Fire sale in Bond Street on November 1 was topped by a kunstkammer object with a Rothschild provenance.

The doors have closed on what could be the final edition of the 'Winter Art & Antiques Fair Olympia' after almost three decades.

Auctioneers and dealers should prepare for the end of credit card surcharges from January 2018, a business trade body has warned.

Bonhams’ Important Design sale in Bond Street on October 25 included this George III mahogany hall settee in the manner of William and John Linnell. Estimated at £8000- 12,000, it sold at £140,000 (plus premium), writes Roland Arkell.

The ownership of a Persian limestone relief sculpture from Persepolis is under investigation by the Manhattan district attorney’s office after it was seized from the stand of Rupert Wace Ancient Art at TEFAF New York.

Dorchester auctioneer Duke’s said it has changed its due diligence procedures after advertising fake works it claimed were by Cornish artist Alfred Wallis (1855-1942).