UK

FROM September 25 to 27 The London Art Book Fair will be launched at the newly expanded Whitechapel Art Gallery in Whitechapel High Street London E1.

LONDON’S Courtauld Institute of Art have stated that their Witt and Conway Libraries will continue to remain open to the public five days a week and their Photographic Survey collections will remain accessible by appointment.

THIS Russian icon depicting St George slaying the dragon generated a lively competition when offered on the third day of Bellmans' sale in Wisborough Green, West Sussex.

Mallett have put on hold plans to leave Bond Street. In the wake of a massive rent rise last year, the London dealers announced their intended departure from the luxury goods thoroughfare, but they have been unable to pass on the lease of the building.

A SUBSTANTIAL, and previously unpublished, collection of letters written by various members of the Bloomsbury Group to Helen Anrep (1885-1965) is to be sold by the East Sussex auctioneers Gorringes in Lewes on September 3, along with a collection of artworks by members of the group consigned from the same estate.

BBC Homes & Antiques magazine is launching a Save Our Antiques Shops campaign in its November issue, promoting the advantages of shopping for antiques and supporting businesses which add to the character of Britain's high streets.

Furniture Futures is the first in a new series of biennial design symposia at the Victoria & Albert Museum.

A STOLEN chequebook has been used to purchase items from at least two antiques shops in Ludlow, Shropshire.

THIS portable regulator signed Thwaites and Reed, London sold for £16,500 (plus 19.5 per cent buyer's premium) at Lawrences of Crewkerne, Somerset on July 10.

KENDAL Auction Rooms, who have operated in Cumbria since 1818, are to rebrand as Eighteen Eighteen Auctioneers.

FOR an item almost destined for a landfill site, this delapidated red leather chesterfield, found in the outhouse of a Northamptonshire rectory, wouldn’t be the first thing you would expect to generate international bidding.

MATTHEW Barton, who has over 20 years experience in the auction business, will hold his first sale under his own banner on November 25 in West Kensington.

THE former premises of Wolverhampton auctioneer Walker Barnett & Hill have reopened again under new management.

THE massive antiques and collectors’ fair held six times a year at RAF Swinderby since 1995 is to move to the Lincoln Showground for all future events.

DAVID Lester’s Florida company International Fine Art Expositions have announced that Freya Simms, who recently stepped down after four years as show director of Olympia’s antique fairs, is joining them as director of sales and marketing at Expoships and IFAE.

HAUGHTON Fairs are to move their venerable International Ceramics Fair & Seminar from its long-time home at the Park Lane Hotel, Piccadilly to the Mall Galleries on Carlton House Terrace, SW1.

Scrimshaw, or carved bone and ivory, is very collectable, but the signature and scenes on this 7in (18cm) long whale’s tooth put it in a special league.

Dreweatts have stepped up their competition for London business by appointing James James-Crook as Director of Business Development, with immediate effect.

This 113/4in (29cm) high slate sculpture titled Maquette for Large Sculpture: Four-Square (Four-Circle) was the first that Penzance auctioneer David Lay had offered for sale.

PARTRIDGE Fine Art, the landmark Bond Street dealership in business for more than 100 years, went into administration this week.