UK

It is one of the best known moments in sport. Donald Bradman, batsman without peer, arrives at the crease in his final test match at the Oval on August 14 1948, requiring just four runs for a Test career average of 100.

WITH interest in Arts and Crafts and The Celtic Revival resurgent, particularly in Scotland, expect a keen reception for an exhibition to be mounted by the prominent Scottish Arts and Crafts specialists Decorative Arts at Doune.

There has been a proliferation of genuine on-the-premises house sales in the provinces over the past few months, with the latest held by Strides (15% buyer’s premium) of Chichester on July 7 at Cooke’s House in West Burton, near Pulborough, West Sussex.

OXFORD’S Ashmolean Museum has made an application to the Heritage Lottery Fund for £23m for a major redevelopment of the building. The new proposals for Europe’s oldest museum include a dedicated education centre, 100 per cent more display space and state-of-the-art environmental control.

AFTER 71 years devoted to art dealing in the capital city, the Society of London Art Dealers have voted to extend their membership to firms anywhere in the United Kingdom. The decision, taken at the annual general meeting on July 15, reflects a majority belief within SLAD that the association should be working for fine art dealers throughout the country and not just those with a place of business within 15 miles of Hyde Park Corner.

Galloway Antiques Fairs of Harrogate travel to the heart of the Home Counties for the weekend of July 25 to 27 for the Cranleigh School Antiques Fair. Galloway hold two fairs a year at the famous Surrey school, a 42-exhibitor event at Easter and this summer fixture which hosts around 35. Both are generally fully booked with a waiting list.

Dollar rate deters American teddy bear enthusiasts: Daniel Agnew, the teddy bear specialist at Christie’s South Kensington (17.5/10% buyer’s premium), felt the market was a bit softer than usual for the first of his bi-annual teddy sales on June 10.

FOR 35 years known simply as The Snape Antiques Fair, for its 36th annual staging, from July 17 to 20, East Anglia’s premier antiques event will be re-labelled the Snape Maltings Antiques and Fine Art Fair.

IT seems the Herefordshire town of Leominster has quite a buzzing antiques trade with the accent on the decorative. In particular it is strong on textiles and one of the local dealers in this field is going to bring her speciality to a wider audience.

In addition to those almost ubiquitous geographical crests, the WH Goss factory embellished their finely potted miniature wares less frequently with images of royalty and nobility, flags, buildings, verses and flora and fauna.

“Art Deco may be the movement of the moment, but the French have received more than their fair share of praise,” says seasoned Deco dealer Eccles Jerome, who is determined to redress the balance and put English furniture from the Deco era firmly on the design map.

DRAWING on long-ago mercantile wealth (don’t mention the slave trade or even, these days, tobacco imports) Bristol has for years rewarded visits by dealers looking for fresh material. But of late the city has been raising its profile as a premier league centre for antiques.

Halls Fine Art of Shrewsbury are to change their regular antiques sales from a Friday to a Wednesday from September. The firm’s Welsh Bridge salerooms will open for a pre-sale public viewing on Saturday mornings for its fine art and antiques sales in a bid to attract a wider public audience.

Solutions should cause ‘least distortion’ to the art market: THE Government have launched the review – announced in this year’s Budget – into how they can improve on the current hand-to-mouth system of saving art for the nation.

TO celebrate the National Art Collection Fund’s centenary, the National Film Theatre in London is to host a six-week season of films this autumn about art and artists.

Victorian painter Sophie Anderson (1823-1903), who specialised in heart-warming female figure studies, appears rather infrequently on the market, but a Hampshire religious institution furnished the Lewes branch of Gorringe’s (15% buyer’s premium) with two good quality, signed half-length female subjects in untouched condition for their June 12 picture sale.

THE Graham Rickett Collection of rowing ephemera offers a unique opportunity for collectors when it comes up for sale as part of Bonhams’ annual sale of traditional rivercraft and marine ephemera on Saturday, July 19 at the Boat Tents, near Leander Club, Henley-on-Thames.

Highlight of the June 24-2 Neal Sons & Fletcher was this Regency green marble-topped table. With brass scroll supports decorated with swan heads and a trefoil base veneered in burr walnut, and with ebony stringing and mouldings, the 2ft 2in (66cm) diameter, 4ft 4in (1.32m) high table had been ensconced in a local country house for many years.

Many in the art world will know of Professor E. T. ‘Teddy’ Hall through his work in archaeometry, the science used to establish the age and origins of much of the world’s ancient art and artefacts, using tests such as thermoluminescence.

NOW into its fourth year and an established favourite with very much its own following, The Original London Textiles, Vintage Fashion and Accessories Fair will be held this Sunday July 13 at Hammersmith Town Hall, King Street, London W6.