UK

A quartet of oils by the contemporary British painter Sherree Valentine-Daines (b.1959) produced multi-estimate prices when they went under the hammer in Sussex.

Consisting of just two autograph leaves, but catalogued as “one of the most important fragments still in private hands”, a manuscript dating from the last years of Mozart’s short life topped a recent London music sale.

In 1930, Jonathan Swift’s 18th century satirical book Gulliver’s Travels was republished by Cresset Press with a suite of illustrations by the British artist Rex Whistler (1905-44).

Chinese art specialist Priestley & Ferraro has moved to a new location in St James’s. The new address is 3 Bury Street, not far from 17 King Street where it had been located since 1996.

Trading as Rose & Brown, organiser Caroline Brown’s 50-stand vintage home and fashion fair takes place on Saturday and Sunday, June 23-24, at the Victoria Hall in Saltaire, West Yorkshire.

Karen Taylor Fine Art returns to Illustrationcupboard Gallery for a second summer show, bringing a selection of British 18th and 19th century paintings and drawings this month.

Exhibitor numbers at Masterpiece rise to 160 as trade prepares for summer showcase.

In a selling show at south London’s Morley College dealer Neil Jennings celebrates the work of Edward Bawden (1903-89).

Country house car boots held in aid of charities are part of the summer season.

The seat of the Curzon family, the present Kedleston Hall, near Derby was designed in 1759 for Sir Nathaniel Curzon by the Palladian architects James Paine and Matthew Brettingham.

Early manuscript compilations for medical and culinary recipes feature quite regularly and successfully at auction, but an example in a recent London sale was one with a morbid statistical addition that achieved a treble-estimate £15,000.

MADAM – The consultation by DEFRA on the proposed government ivory ban seemingly gave no information for or against a total ban on ivory which could help respondents have an informed opinion.

Stroud Auction Rooms has moved into a grade-II listed property in the Gloucestershire market town while securing a second site for future expansion.

In the bottle collecting field, they are calling it ‘one of the best ever finds’.

Public relations and fairs specialist Freya Simms is a mere two weeks into the job as chief executive of dealer body LAPADA but has hit the ground running.

St Augustine of Hippo’s De civitate Dei (below) was penned to counter pagan claims that what had prompted the Visigoth sacking of Rome in 410 was the adoption of Christianity by its emperors. The book was first printed around a thousand years later in the 1460s, but it was 150 years before a first English language edition appeared.

Paul and Alex Peacock started trading four years ago and opened a showroom in Pimlico earlier this month. They are exhibiting at The Art & Antiques Fair Olympia from June 20-27. Below, Paul discusses the pair’s transformation from collectors to dealers.

As regimental silver, the Victorian centrepiece shown below qualified to be part of the Militaria, Coins & Medals sale at Lawrences (22% buyer’s premium) of Crewkerne and, as a memento of the gallant 9th (The Queen’s Royal) Lancers, it swept the field.

Our weekly selection from salerooms and dealerships.