News

There are very few positives to take from the latest findings of The Antique Collectors’ Club’s Annual Furniture Index (AFI). For reasons of fashion and function, the English antique furniture market remains in a parlous state and no category from early oak to Georgian mahogany held firm.

Leading the latest series of Impressionist & Modern auctions in London, a textbook Cubist still life by Juan Gris (1887-1927) sold for £31m at Christie’s.

Sotheby’s have appointed Alexander Rotter and Cheyenne Westphal as worldwide heads of Sotheby’s Contemporary art department, and Helena Newman and Simon Shaw as worldwide heads of Sotheby’s Impressionist & Modern art department.

Last October, South Africa House in Trafalgar Square, London hosted an exhibition of artworks in the image of, and inspired by, Nelson Mandela.

Sotheby’s board have acted to fend off criticism from shareholders led by hedge fund billionaire Daniel Loeb by saying they will issue a $300m special dividend in March.

The prize consignment of paintings, sketches, ceramics and ephemera produced by key members of the Rhead family of potters, offered by Bearnes, Hampton & Littlewood in Exeter on January 22-23, comprised 117 lots in all.

It was the most important consignment of work by the Rhead family to come onto the market in years. But would the respect in which the remarkable dynasty of potters are held translate into remarkable prices?