UK

The University of Wolverhampton have announced they will launch a new two-year Foundation Degree in Auctioneering and Valuation in February 2009.

Following a successful conclusion to one of the largest cases of its type in years, a serial forger has been jailed for the faking and forging of antique silver flatware. Here ATG publish material accumulated during the investigation in an attempt to minimise the impact of the fakes on the spoon market.

THIS extremely rare 18th Century Khyber knife was the highlight of the London sale conducted by Norfolk-based sporting gun specialist Holts, where it sold for a surprise £38,000.

DEALERS and auctioneers have had a timely reminder of the dangers of accepting cheques as payment, with the jailing of a conwoman who amassed over £2m worth of art and antiques.

THE question of authenticity remains high on the agenda in the Banksy market after a last-minute intervention by the self-styled guerrilla artist had a devastating effect on Lyon & Turnbull’s latest attempt to break into the London contemporary art market.

J.P. Humbert opened their new saleroom in Towcester on September 25. After five years at a site on Burcote Road site they can now be found in a 4000 sq ft premises on the Silverstone Business Park situated off the A43.

The volume of artist Louis Wain’s distinctive ceramic animals making a sudden appearance on the market has raised the possibility that some could be reproductions or fakes. Seven have been offered at various UK salerooms in the last month, while two suspect examples have already been pulled from a Bonhams sale.

Gloucestershire auctioneers Simon Chorley began their autumn season on September 18, selling this Louis XIV ebony, ivory and tortoiseshell cabinet for £65,000 (plus 15 per cent buyer's premium).

Bonhams Oxford are to leave the city centre in favour of new premises in a village just north of the city.

WORK to restore the Art Deco facade of Alfies Antique Market in London’s Marylebone has now been finished to much acclaim from the local area.

MEDIA interest in the Pietro Psaier controversy saw members of the national press in attendance at John Nicholson’s Fernhurst rooms on September 24 for the sale of 235 artworks.

AROUND 200 valuable pieces of jewellery, silver, porcelain and furniture were stolen after thieves broke into an Oxfordshire manor house, using sledgehammers to break through two walls.

Quarterly sales of modestly-priced art and antiques, which were introduced for the first time this year by leading Shropshire auction house Halls, are to become a regular fixture in the company’s sales calendar.

As experienced art dealers discussed the £95.6m sale of 233 new works by Damien Hirst (b.1965), it was the word 'celebrity' that cropped up the most to explain the phenomenal prices seen at the Beautiful Inside my Head Forever sale.

CHRISTIE’S have announced that their sale of the joint stock of the two London dealerships Hotspur and Jeremy will be at a dedicated auction at their King Street rooms on November 20.

Trading Standards say they have received a number of complaints from unpaid consignors in the wake of the fine art sale held by Walker Barnett & Hill in June.

MORE than £80,000 worth of jewellery was stolen from the Ardingly Showground on Wednesday, September 3.

The Tate announced a record year for acquisitions in their 2007/8 Annual Report. The Tate Collection aquired 494 works, valued at £63.1m, of which 320 were gifts and bequests from collectors and artists.

This large three-section glass panel was designed and made by Paul Jefferies at the Whitefriars factory in 1966.