News

Sales in the USA 20th Century Lighting and Quality Antiques was the title of the $2.2m (£1,549,295) January 27 sale conducted by Fontaine Auction Gallery (12 per cent buyer’s premium) in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, but it was certainly the former that made this quarterly catalogue so noteworthy. Of 497 lots offered, almost 200 were occupied by table/boudoir lamps, light fittings shades and stained glass panels by the likes of Handel, Pairpoint, Suess and, of course, the Tiffany Studios.

UK: THE late Bob Ewers is remembered fondly by devotees of diecast toys as one of the key players in founding the UK’s first static model collectors club in Maidenhead in 1969, and there was an enormous response to the dispersal of his collection at the Lewes salerooms of Wallis & Wallis (15 per cent buyer‘s premium) on February 12.

UK: FOLLOWING these Surrey room’s Gaudy Welsh extravaganza last November, a further 40 pieces featured in their 500-lot January sale.

ITALY: MINIATURE-like, this (33 x 47mm) silver medal of the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II (1619-37) made Li950,000 (£315). The Imperial Crown on the reverse is preserved in the Hofschatz in Vienna.

UK: THE current strength of the market for anything by L.S. Lowry (1887-1976) has often been reported in these pages. On February 23 it was the turn of Chichester auctioneers Strides (15 per cent buyer’s premium) to experience the lure of the Salford-born artist when Old houses, the 15 by 19in (38 x 48cm) oil on plywood shown here, came under the hammer.

US: THE Isle of Wight is seen at lower right in the map illustrated here, which is part of the first large-scale geological map of any country ever issued, Delineation of the Strata of England and Wales, with Part of Scotland... by William Smith.

UK: THE 105-lot furniture section harboured all the best prices in the first of Maxwells, Wilmslow, quarterly Antiques and Collectors Items auctions of the year.