UK

RARELY do organisers get together for a joint venture but David Smith of EW Services and Nick Cox of Abbey Art Deco Fairs did just that for the first Southampton Art Deco Fair, held at Southampton university on Sunday April 27.

NOT a fair that has in recent years maintained a very high profile but nevertheless the annual Buxton Antiques Fair has been running for nearly 40 years and is a lot better quality fixture than many better publicised ones.

BATTERSEA dealer Robert Young, the country’s only specialist in English and European folk art, holds his fourth annual Exhibition of Antique Folk Art from May 16 to 24 at his showrooms at 68 Battersea Bridge Road, London SW11.

AN UNUSED photographic postcard showing the ‘The New White Star Liner Titanic... nearing completion: locked in the largest graving dock in the world, Belfast, February 1912’, was one of the more popular lots in a sale of books, cigarette, trade and postcards, plus autograph material, held by Acorn Auctions of Salford on April 15. It sold at £210.

AUCTIONEERS and valuers Tayler & Fletcher have merged with Chartered Surveying specialists, land and estate agents Humberts.

MOST numismatic material when offered at auction comes up in London. Sometimes this is not the case and then frequently a better-than-usual price is achieved.

ALTERNATIVE investment might be too strong a word for it, but the current desperate state of returns in the stock market and other investment areas does seem to be having a positive effect at art sales, at least in Scotland.

ALTHOUGH the London Original Print Fair has finished its four-day run on April 27, there remain a number of enticing events for print aficionados.

FAMOUS since the 16th century for its boys’ school, the small Rutland market town of Uppingham can also brag about being the home of the Goldmark Gallery. With a secondhand book department, this very amiable and innovative gallery always has much to delight, particularly in the field of 20th century prints.

THE war in Iraq does not appear to have had any obvious effect on the latest series of lslamic sales, held in London last week. There was still an international turnout for the three main auctions of Islamic works of art and, in a field usually characterised by selective buying, the selling rates were not especially different, with a take-up in lot terms ranging from just over half the content at Bonhams and Christie’s King Street to just over two thirds at Sotheby’s.

THE move towards better prices for silver took Cumbrian auctioneers Penrith Farmers' & Kidd's rather by surprise at their 1125-lot quarterly catalogue sale on March 26 (15% buyer's premium inc. VAT) – although it was a wine-related item which did the honours and these do have their own buoyant market.

IT’S been a long time since any auctioneer chose to illustrate his catalogue front cover with an array of silver candlesticks but this was the rather heartening decision by The Bristol Auction Rooms for their April 8 sale (12.77% buyer's premium inc. VAT) and their enlightened, so to speak, move was rewarded when all the lots, from George IV to 1967, sold within or above the admittedly modest three-figure expectations.

HAMPSHIRE dealers Millers Antiques offer a 20 per cent discount on all stock at their Open Weekend to be held at Netherbrook House, 86 Christchurch Road, Ringwood from May 9 to 12.

WORK has started on restoring the Victorian listed building occupied by Cumbria Auction Rooms, in Lowther Street, Carlisle to its former glory. H&H King, the Fine Art, Antiques and Furniture division of the H&H Group, will temporarily be conducting auctions from the old Furniture Hall at Borderway Mart, Rosehill, Carlisle, during the month-long first phase of refurbishment, due to end in the third week of May.

Potential impact on legal trade still not clear: Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell has set out a five-point plan for the future protection of cultural objects in the light of the looting in Iraq. Central to the plan is the adoption of MP Richard Allan’s Private Member’s Bill, which failed to proceed in parliament earlier this year.

ANTIQUE dealers and interior designers are to the fore in the second annual Pimlico Road Garden Week which will be held from May 19 to 24 to coincide with the nearby Chelsea Flower Show.

THE National Association of Valuers and Auctioneers hold their Spring meeting at the Southampton Institute this Friday, May 9.

WELL-known at the quality fairs, Oriental specialists Glade Antiques hold their first selling exhibition at their Buckinghamshire galleries from May 4 to 18.

BELFAST was the city that built the Titanic and the connection between the doomed liner and the Northern Irish capital has always been strong. The news of the tragedy was devastating to the thousands of men who had worked on the ship, their families, and to all the people of Belfast, perhaps none more so than James Lord Pirrie, uncle of Thomas Andrews, the designer of the Titanic and chairman of Harland & Wolff, the famous shipyard where it was built.

Devon auctioneers SJ Hales (15 per cent buyer’s premium) have moved to a wider field than the ceramics, and particularly Staffordshire, on which they founded their reputation but this area remains their strength. The 500 varied ceramic lots and nearly 200 Staffordshire pieces took most of the better prices among the 1500 offerings at the new Bovey Tracey rooms on March 12 and 13.