Features

Photographica 2019 is a destination for collectors of classic cameras. The fair hosts up to 135 tables for buying, selling and swapping classic and antique cameras from across the country.

Special Auction Services regularly holds sales of photographic equipment cameras and photographs in its Newbury rooms.

Zooming to a rather higher than predicted result in a collectables auction held earlier this month by Southgate Auction Rooms (20% buyer’s premium) was this camera and slides.

A label to this 21 x 16½in (53 x 42cm) print reads 'Photograph of the Moon, taken by Prof Henry Draper, MD, with a silvered glass Telescope, Fifteen and a Half Inches Aperture, Hastings NY September 3rd 1863'.

Philippe Fortuné Durand is regarded as the first professional photographer in France.

Watch collectors priced out of the market for blue-chip branded sports models are finding value for money elsewhere.

When it comes to early or vintage photographs the interest is often centred around the social history of the material – the camera’s ability to document past events, be they special occasions or scenes of everyday life.

The ‘Big Red’ Daytona reference 6265 is one of the most desirable Rolex chronographs from the 1980s.

A private single-owner collection of around 180 lots from one vintage photographer was the subject of a recent sale held by Chiswick Auctions (25% buyer’s premium) in London.

Universal Genève helped change the horological landscape in 1934 with the introduction of an affordable two-button Compur chronograph – a line that continued into the 1940s.

Early views of China are often best-sellers in the realm of topographical photography. An album of 83 albumen prints from the 1860s-70s proved to be a major attraction at Bonhams’ latest book sale held in Knightsbridge.

Heuer watches, steeped in racing history, are among the ‘secondary’ or ‘niche’ Swiss brands that have entered the mainstream collecting arena in the past decade.

'Electricité', pictured below, is one of a limited edition portfolio of 10 photogravures after Man Ray’s Rayographs from a 1931 commercial commission from the artist by the Compagnie Parisienne de Distribution d’Electricité.

It was during the First World War that the convenience of the wristwatch began to replace the pocketwatch but it really came into its own with the production of bespoke ‘tool’ watches for submariners and airmen later in the century.

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).

An exhibition of 36 views of Mount Fuji, inspired by Hokusai’s famous print series, is presented by dealer Daniella Dangoor at the 'London Photograph Fair: Special Edition'.

The largest battleships ever constructed in Germany posed a huge threat to the Allies. A rare medal group sold in London tells the remarkable story of how one of them was disabled.

Once the Tirpitz had been damaged by midget submarines (see main story this section), the German battle cruiser Scharnhorst was left to tackle British convoys to Russia alone. A trap was set by the Royal Navy in December 1943.

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then the British were clearly impressed by the French lancer regiments they encountered during the Napoleonic Wars. The first British lancer regiments were established in 1816, just a year after Waterloo.

A 2m (6ft 7in) pen and ink drawing, estimated at £5000-7000 in Olympia Auctions on April 17 in west London, forms an intriguing eyewitness view of the final moments of the Indian Mutiny.