North America

The He-Man film out now has struggled at the box office but the character in a smaller form amazed saleroom bidders.

When a Philadelphia family consigned Europa, a 1927 painting by Czech Modernist Josef Šíma (1891-1971), to Freeman’s (28/21% buyer’s premium) last year, it prompted scholars and art historians to do a double take.

Two of the most desirable of all W Britains toy soldier sets were offered in Morphy’s (23% buyer’s premium) Toys & General Collectibles auction on June 2-3.

Ever heard of scripophily? It is fair to say that Tim Welo is a bit of an enthusiast.

The 18th annual sale presented by Perfume Bottles Auction (20/25% buyer’s premium) took place on May 2. The online auction, conducted in New York by Ken Leach, served as the finale of the 2026 convention of the International Perfume Bottle Association (IFBA).

New England Auctions – Fred Giampietro (26% buyer’s premium) of Branford, Connecticut, continues to win big with leech jars from the collection of the late Dr Jerry Phelps (1935-2025), an anesthesiologist from Kentucky.

What does it take to run a vintage or antiques business in the US selling European interiors items to American buyers?

Raised in Miami Beach, Stephen Farber’s distinguished medical career took him to New York, St Louis, Ann Arbor, Charlottesville, and Toledo. And along the way, he bought books.

Robert Sterling Brunk passed away on Thursday, June 11, 2026, at age 84.

A triple-faced owl vase by the Zsolnay factory hammered for $9000 (£6610) at Thomaston Place Auction Galleries (25% buyer’s premium).

A steel Katar dagger, made in the Tanjore region of India in the 17th or 18th century, hammered way above hopes at Ripley Auctions (25% buyer’s premium) in Indianapolis.

A Montague Dawson (1890-1973) watercolour, 'With the Wind', hammered for $44,000 (£32,700) at New Orleans Auction Galleries (25% buyer’s premium) against a guide of $3000-5000.

A 16th century gilt bronze tomb figure of St Jerome that had suffered ignominies before reaching the auction block hammered for $32,500 (£24,100) against a guide of $6000-8000 at Richard Opfer (23% buyer’s premium).

An early work by Mary Jane Peale (1827-1902), a member of the famed family of American artists, hammered for $275,000 (£204,000) against a guide of $5000-8000 at Doyle (27% buyer’s premium).

One of only two known portraits of a black sitter by a woman artist in the late 19th century has been acquired by a Canadian museum from a London dealer.

Pelé’s Brazil 1958 match-worn World Cup final shirt is up for auction with an estimate ‘in excess of $6m’.

Both the first and the first trade editions of A Room of One’s Own (1929) were among a collection of eight Virginia Woolf lots included in the April 16 Rare Books, Autographs, & Maps auction at Doyle (28% buyer’s premium) in New York.

An “exceedingly uncommon” signed and inscribed photograph of the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) earned top-lot honours in an Autographs sale held at Swann.

Book owner’s son realised the impact this landmark work would have