Grosvenor, who now lives in Edinburgh, will join the board this month and will work alongside the auction firms’ senior management, managing director Gavin Strang and international director Lee Young.
Strang said: “Bendor brings a vast number of skills to the board including his breadth and knowledge of Old Master paintings and his expertise in the digital world. His appointment will allow us to expand the company’s reach both nationally and internationally.”
Grosvenor, who previously worked with Philip Mould at his London gallery, has co-presented arts programmes for the BBC including Britain's Lost Masterpieces and Fake or Fortune? He also runs his own blog Art History News and is also a member of the ‘Art Detective steering panel’ for Art UK (formerly the Public Catalogue Foundation).
Grosvenor said: “I have spent most of my career being a dealer, but I have always secretly wanted to be an auctioneer. The auction world has such potential to help bring the Old Masters, with their endlessly fascinating stories, to new audiences, something I am passionate about.”
Grosvenor is best known for re-discovering lost paintings by Old Master artists such as Sir Peter Paul Rubens, Peter Brueghel the Younger and Sir Anthony Van Dyck. His most significant Scottish art discovery was finding a lost portrait of Bonnie Prince Charlie by Allan Ramsay, which was recently acquired by the Scottish National Portrait Gallery.
