Auctioneers

THE troubled Toronto-based auctioneers Ritchies have finally closed after they were declared bankrupt by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice.

ON December 9, Morton and Eden are to offer what is possibly the most important collection of Renaissance medals to come onto the market in decades.

Politically correct it is not, but the ‘Negro Cricketer’ pattern, produced for just one year in 1907, certainly ranks among the rarest and most desirable of Royal Doulton series wares.

ESTIMATED at £800-1200, this Victorian silver ewer modelled as a kangaroo sold for £24,000 at Chorley's of Prinknash Abbey, Gloucestershire on October 22 to a London dealer on the telephone who saw off competition from Australia and France.

GUERNSEY auctioneers Martel Maides look set to become the latest UK regional firm to benefit from the rise and rise of Chinese mark and period porcelain after three Yongzheng period (1723-1735) famille rose bowls were consigned by a Channel Islands family who have owned them for at least 80 years.

BONHAMS have appointed Jonathan Horwich as Global Director of Picture Sales, starting on December 1.

CHRISTIE’S have launched a one-stop insurance service for UK private clients, taking in all their insurance requirements in a single-payment policy package.

THE familiar Art and Antiques mini-catalogues synonymous with Bonhams' regional general sales are to disappear at the end of the year.

A MASSIVE Union Flag that flew from one of the ships at the battle of Trafalagar has sold at auction for £320,000.

ATG columnist Richard Falkiner has hailed the Roman cameo glass vase which has been unveiled by Bonhams as “the greatest classical find since the Portland Vase”.

IS there still life in the Irish art market? The auction record for a piece of sculpture by an Irish artist was broken at Adam's 140-lot sale of Irish art on October 14.

SOTHEBY’S latest Hong Kong Asian series saw mainland Chinese buyers come of age in the field of Imperial Chinese art.

AMONG the more run-of-the-mill furnishings that constitute the bulk of the popular Interiors sales at Christie’s South Kensington, there are often a handful of more quirky items.

It was Moorcroft’s take on flambé glazes that produced the highest price at Bonhams’ latest Ceramic Design sale.

SPECIALISTS at Bonhams have just announced that they have identified a magnificent Roman cameo glass vase, which may be the most important of its kind in the world.

FROM May 1913, the first distinctive Commonwealth of Australia banknotes were issued. They were controversial in that no portrait of the reigning monarch, George V, was included in the design.

METASTASIS, to most people, is a word with rather grim connotations – referring as it does to the spread of cancer. Applied to a set of playing cards, however, it has an altogether different and more attractive meaning.

LEADING UK fine art auctioneers Dreweatts have established a separate company governed by independent directors to handle clients’ money.

THE first Conspicuous Gallantry Cross group to appear at auction also became the highest-priced lot to sell via ATG's live bidding platform the-saleroom.com when it was hammered down for £88,000 at Dix Noonan Webb on September 18.

IT’S all change among Australia’s leading auctioneers as Goodmans, linked to Bonhams since 2003, are to adopt the Sotheby’s brand instead.