Oxford

An instantly recognisable William Russell Flint (1880-1969) watercolour drew a strenuous competition at Mallams in Oxford last week.

Eighty lots from a local estate ensured a flying start to Mallams’ recent sale in Oxford and provided an insight into the taste and interests of a collector buying 60 years ago.

Following the success of last year’s Oxford conference for art and antiques professionals, Jeremy Lamond of Halls and Rupert Toovey of Toovey’s have announced the 2014 event will be held on Friday and Saturday, September 12-13.

In the islands of the Pacific, where hardwood trees were abundant and iron virtually non-existent until the 19th century, the fighting club was elevated to an art form – made in a wider variety of forms and with more lavish decoration than any other weapon.

The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford has been given an important private collection of modern and contemporary Chinese art.

Bonhams are to move their specialist oak and vernacular furniture and sporting memorabilia sales to Oxford from Chester as part of a further review of their regional operations.

The original autograph draft manuscript for Gerard Manley Hopkins’ 1879 poem ‘Binsey Poplars’ has been acquired by the Bodleian Libraries.

The collection of close to 500 silver and gold objects donated to the Ashmolean museum in Oxford by the late dealer-collector Michael Wellby has been described as the most important bequest of its type for over a century.

This Shirvan Marasali prayer rug is part of a private collection of Caucasian rugs consigned to Mallams’ sale in Oxford on January 23.

Mallams’ Gentleman’s Library Sale in Oxford on October 31 will be the first to benefit from a new the-saleroom.com delivery service.

Pictured here are delegates on the steps of the Ashmolean Museum during the Oxford Conference, a two-day event for auctioneers organised by Rupert Toovey of Toovey’s and Jeremy Lamond of Halls.

Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum has announced that it had succeeded in an eight-month campaign to save Edouard Manet’s ‘Portrait of Mademoiselle Claus’ for the nation.

EXHIBITION: The bicentenary of the birth of Edward Lear will see works from private collections go on display for the first time during an exhibition at the Ashmolean.

Rupert Toovey of Toovey’s and Jeremy Lamond of Halls are bringing the auctioneering profession together in Oxford for a black tie gala dinner on Friday, September 21, followed by lectures the next day.

WHEN the Royal Navy seized an enemy patrol boat in the Falklands War the name of it must have given particular satisfaction at the capture.

THE vital part trade has played in the history of collecting is the theme of a two-day conference at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford on June 15 and 16.

IT could have been one of the sleepers of the century had it not been recognised and swiftly withdrawn from a Bonhams Oxford auction.

THOMAS Grant Dixon formed his Worcester collection from 1940-70. This discerning collector was a great friend of H. Rissik Marshall, the famed Worcester collector and author whose collection now resides in the Ashmolean at Oxford.

BANBURY saleroom Holloway's, who stopped holding fortnightly general sales last September in order to focus on the fine art and specialist events, are starting a programme of regular sales of European ceramics and glass, the first of which will be held on March 29.

FOUND earlier this year in a house near Oxford where they were carrying out a probate valuation, auctioneers Mallams offered for sale this seminal painting Bravo! by C.R.W. Nevinson (1889-1946) on October 13.