Auctions

Two previously unpublished watercolours painted by Lady Anne Barnard (1750-1825) during her momentous visit to the Cape of Good Hope emerged for sale at Stephan Welz & Co in South Africa earlier this month. They came for sale from the descendants of Lady Anne who had owned them since 1966.

A Pre-Raphaelite drawing once owned by LS Lowry drew lively competition at the latest round of 19th century art sales in London.

Our weekly selection from salerooms and dealerships.

Pieces from the late 19th century, a vibrant but occasionally derided moment in the history of the decorative arts, provided many of the highlights to Sworders’ summer Fine Interiors sale in Stansted Montfitchet.

The demand for 1960s Pulcini glass birds made by Alessandro Pianon (1931-64) for the Venetian company Vistosi has spiked in recent months.

Our listing of British and Irish book auctions taking place from July 16-27, 2019.

Visit by auctioneer to a regular auction-goer’s apartment uncovers Wedgwood collection.

Pleased as the vendors were to be told by Gloucestershire auctioneer Martin Lambert that a 1920s trunk from their late parents’ home could be worth £2000, they were happier when pre-sale interest in Tayler & Fletcher’s recent sale brought a revised estimate of £2500-4000.

An “extremely rare” grouping of military items including a British 1899 issue leather hobnail boot with a shrapnel hole sold for £6500 at a Buckinghamshire auction on July 3.

Just four months after identifying two tiny compositional drawings as the work of John Constable (1776- 1837) and selling them for close to £90,000, west London saleroom Chiswick Auctions struck gold again with a third ‘rediscovered’ landscape.

The classic ‘orange’ Pulcini glass bird is deemed the most common of the five designed by Pianon.

Saved at the last minute from a skip, a collection of Aboriginal weapons drew worldwide interest at Martel Maides’ sale in St Peter Port, Guernsey.

An 1841 guide to London’s ladies of the night sold by Hansons for £3300 featured recently in ATG (No 2390), and one of the many rarities that emerged from the recent Gloucestershire sale of the late Martin Orsky’s library was a group of four 18th century broadsides advertising prostitutes.

Far and away the highest result for an Asian work of art in recent sales in Germany, Austria and Switzerland was the spectacular price of SFr4.2m (£3.3m) achieved by Koller in Zurich for a Chinese bronze censer (see front page, ATG No 2397).

A large canvas by the Taiwan-born British minimalist Richard Lin (1933-2011) sailed to £84,000 at Ludlow saleroom McCartneys (17% buyer’s premium), setting a house record in the process.

Tennants credited “fresh-to-market pictures with a strong provenance” as the driving force behind the notable results in its Modern and Contemporary Art sale.

Bamfords’ James Lewis has set a new Guinness World Record for the 'Longest Auction by One Single Auctioneer'.