Auctioneers

UK: International bidders tuned into proceedings at Canterbury Auction Galleries on October 2, 1999 in the prospect of acquiring one of the earliest ship-to-shore receivers, illustrated right, manufactured in 1908 by the founding father of commercial radio communication – Guglielmo Marconi.

UK: PARIS salons were well known for flatulence in conversation. After each manned flight of giant balloons from the gardens of Versailles during the late 18th and 19th centuries, young men who wished to sound like scientists would earnestly debate whether hydrogen gas or hot air allowed the better flight.

UK: AN international mix of private collectors, dealers and institutions turned out to bid for an old and celebrated collection of European glass formed by the late Dr. Otto Dettmers of Bremen when it went under the hammer at Sotheby’s in London last week on November 23.

WIDESPREAD rumours of the imminent takeover of London auctioneers Phillips were confirmed last week as Bernard Arnault’s luxury goods group Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton (LVMH) paid a reported £70m for the whole of the Phillips Auction Group.

UK: IT MAY have been a mahogany wine cooler, but did its massive proportions and one-time residence in St Alban’s Cathedral suggest that it had formerly been used as a christening bath for babies rather than for beverages?

UK: THE LINK between the woven silk portrait illustrated right and the modern world of computing may not be instantly apparent, but this 6in x 4in (16 x 11cm) silk panel, albeit a curiosity rather than a key scientific document, had a successful part to play in the Weinreb Computer Collection, which was sold by Bloomsbury Book Auctions in London on October 28.

UK: BRIEF as any report dating back to September 28 must be, it is worth recording some successes at the Birmingham rooms of Fellow & Sons (10 per cent buyer’s premium).

US: THE MARKET for Impressionist and Modern art saw further consolidation last week when Sotheby’s and Christie’s turned over a premium inclusive $466m (£289.5m) for their November sales of works by the world’s most expensive artists.

CHRISTIE'S International has had a radical rethink of its Internet strategy, disbanding its Internet Auctions division, which it created in May as a separate entity, and shelving plans to sell online.

Phillips were making no comment last week following confident assertions in the Financial Times that a French takeover of the last of the top three auctioneers under UK ownership was imminent.

HONG KONG: There were major series of sales in Hong Kong for Sotheby’s and Christie’s last week with both rooms offering selections of Chinese ceramics and works of art, jewellery and paintings.

UK: A heart-shaped London delft pill slab of c.1660-70, 12 x 10in (30 x 25cm), painted in blue, ochre and turquoise with the arms of the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries.

US: SOTHEBY’S have opened their new-look, custom-built Manhattan headquarters at 1334 York Avenue, New York, adding six new floors above the four which previously housed the auction house.

UK: THE world record auction price for a photograph was broken twice at the Sotheby’s London sale of the Photographic Collection of Marie-Thérèse and André Jammes on October 27.

UK: THIS pair of vases, 11in (28cm) high, from the sideboard of a house in Herstmonceux, East Sussex, set a new record for Moorcroft when they appeared at Gorringes Lewes on October 19.

NETHERLANDS: Van Gogh’s oil landscape A Park in Spring, was the highlight of the inaugural exhibition to mark the opening of Sotheby’s new Netherlands headquarters on October 15.

US: PROFITS from the catalogue for Christie’s New York’s October 27 and 28 Marilyn Monroe auction may bring as much as the sale itself.

FRANCE: AFTER a hearing with the examining magistrate on September 29, leading Paris auctioneer Jacques Tajan has been charged with “suborning a witness and serious breach of trust” over the sale of bronzes by Alberto Giacometti at Drouot in July 1994.

UK: Charles Napier Hemy’s seascape Life 4ft 6in x 6ft (1.24m x 1.83m), signed and dated 1913, with reverse inscription, set a record for Salisbury auctioneers Woolley & Wallis on October 12 when it sold for a double mid-estimate £110,000 plus premium.

FRANCE: THE French government is to prosecute New York art dealer Adam Williams for handling stolen goods after a painting he bought at Christie’s in London turned out to be Nazi looted art. A successful prosecution could have serious repercussions for the Trade.