UK

Despite the latest Covid-19 demands, fair organisers are finding ways to go ahead.

On the same day as Chiswick Auctions’ British & European Fine Art auction (see main report), a sale of Old Master Paintings & Drawings took place immediately beforehand. Comprising nearly 50 lots, it totalled £102,500 including buyer’s premium.

A painting of apple blossom by the Austrian Impressionist Olga Wisinger-Florian (1844-1926) drew a five-way online bidding battle at Canterbury Auction Galleries (24% buyer’s premium inc VAT) on August 1.

Claude Francis Barry’s wartime work The Heart of the Empire, Our Finest Hour, 1940, is among the highlights coming up at Liss Llewellyn’s second season of Hidden Gems.

You might not have been able to get to Portobello Road antiques market on Sunday, September 27, but you could have tried instead a fair on Instagram which ran on the same day from 11am to 1pm.

More indoor antiques and collectables fairs have been called off as coronavirus cases rise again and restrictions increase.

Separated for many years, portraits of two brothers by WBE Ranken (1881-1941) came up at auction at different London salerooms last week. The fact that they emerged on the market simultaneously was seemingly pure coincidence.

Edward Bawden (1903-89) was one of a number of artists invited to submit designs ahead of Britain’s changeover to decimal coinage. Designs were invited for six coins: the 1p, 2p, 5p, 10p, 20p and 50p pieces.

London dealer Jack Webb, who died last year aged 94, was known for the variety of unusual pieces at his Camden Passage shop, but the D-Day veteran’s personal enthusiasm was for militaria.

Until the process of independence began (starting with Ghana in 1957), photography in West Africa had been mainly a bureaucratic tool and was viewed with suspicion.