France

A group of 15 works on paper by Salvador Dalí (1904-89) which were produced as Christmas card designs will be offered in Paris this summer. They are estimated to raise up to €1m at Artcurial’s Modern and Impressionist Art auction in Paris, writes Alex Capon.

Further proof of the success of the dedicated dealer and auction house initiatives promoting Asian art and expertise in Western capitals comes next month in Paris.

Included in a mixed-discipline sale held in Paris by Daguerre (28% buyer’s premium inc VAT) at Drouot was a Sèvres bough pot in soft paste porcelain.

The highlight of a dedicated ceramics sale held at Drouot by Fraysse (22.17% buyer’s premium) was this large 16 x 22in (41 x 56cm) early French, Moustiers, faience basin made at the Clerissy factory.

A drawing offered at a Paris auction with an attribution to Italian Renaissance painter Giovanni Francesco Penni (1488-1528) was hammered down at €1.13m (£980,000).

Drawings Week in the French capital included a wide variety of styles, eras and value. Pictured here is a selection of highlights and some more affordable items from the vast array of works on paper of all types offered during Drawings Week in Paris in late March.

The ‘Toulouse Caravaggio’ is currently on show at Paris Contemporary art dealership Galerie Kamel Mennour opposite a work more than 400 years its junior.

Not everything in the spring drawings sales required a six-figure bank balance to purchase. Plenty of more affordable works appeared across all the Paris rooms – both Drouot and the independents (and, of course, in the various dealers shows and fairs). Pictured here are some works within the reach of less elevated budgets.

This gouache is one of around 10 drawings, watercolours and gouaches by René Gruau, the Italian-born fashion illustrator who was renowned for his Paris haute couture and promotional illustrations, which will feature in Tajan’s Paris auction of modern drawings on May 15.

A double helping of vintage cameras and photographic equipment was recently staged at Chartres by the Ivoire group Lelièvre, Pascal, Maiche, Paris (20% buyer’s premium).

Pioneer collection of street furniture goes from Parisian flat to the saleroom.