London

The Art & Antiques Fair Olympia will take place on only one floor of the West London exhibition centre for its summer edition, a change from the event’s previous staging across two levels.

Offered as a part of the natural history section of a May 14 book sale at Sotheby’s (25/20/13.9% buyer’s premium) is an extremely rare photobook on New Zealand ferns by Herbert Boucher Dobbie issued c.1880 – no copy of which, it seems, has previously been seen at auction.

Queen star Brian May is also a huge Victorian photo fan.

A new art fair launching at the Saatchi Gallery this June is a late addition to the busy schedule of London’s summer art events.

A 1782 first of James Stewart’s 'Plocacosmos: or, the Whole Art of Hair Dressing' illustrated with 10 plates showing hairstyles was offered as part of a Forum Auctions sale.

Dealer Andrew Sim has sold 14 Second World War pictures by Polish-born artist Feliks Topolski (1907-89) to the Imperial War Museum.

St James’s art dealer Derek Johns is offering a portrait of Sir Everard Fawkener, a former British ambassador to Constantinople, by Swiss artist Jean-Etienne Liotard (1702-89).

Estimated at just £50-80, an Alice Davis Hitchcock medallion sold for £3000 (plus 20% buyer’s premium) at a Spink auction in London on April 10.

Organisers looking for an unusual spot at which to hold a fair might consider the setting alongside an outdoor swimming pool.

Stephen Ongpin deals in drawings and watercolours from the 16th-20th centuries in London, St James’s.

George Catlin’s watercolour sketches of North American Indians, reported in ATG No 2387, were the star turns as far as original artworks were concerned at Forum Auctions (25/20/12% buyer’s premium) on March 28. However, two original, signed caricatures by Max Beerbohm also brought good results.

Although unmarked, this gold, enamel and diamond brooch offered by Bonhams Knightsbridge (27.5/25% buyer’s premium) was almost certainly made by Tiffany in New York c.1890.

UK fine art dealer Dickinson features a single-owner collection of 20th century masters at TEFAF New York Spring next month.

It was on the battlefield of Balaclava on October 25, 1854 that the name of James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan (1797-1868) first became etched into public memory.

A late 19th century gold bone-handled Arab dagger was hammered down at £4100 at the inaugural sale of Knightsbridge auction house Kings Russell (22% buyer’s premium).