Wales

VETERAN organiser Donald Bayliss, who operates out of Ludlow as Continuity Fairs, reports a stunning response to his first International Antiques and Collectors Fair of Wales, which was launched at the Royal Welsh Showground at Builth Wells over the Bank Holiday weekend of May 3 and 4.

SOLD AT £600 (Temple) in the April 25 sale held by Y Gelli (15% buyer's premium) in Hay-on-Wye was a “much nicer than average” copy of the 1886, privately printed, Lahore first edition of Rudyard Kipling’s Departmental Ditties and other Verses. One of 350 copies of this tall, narrow production, printed on one side only, it was in the original wrappers but with the flap removed, leaving an uneven fore-edge to the upper wrapper.

WALES’S top dealer in things Welsh, Richard Bebb, holds his annual selling exhibition of vernacular crafts at his showrooms, Country Antiques, Castle Mill in Kidwelly, Carmarthenshire from May 28 to June 7.

BIRTHDAY greetings to the Carmarthen Antiques and Collectors Fair, for a decade Wales’ top antiques show.

AN album containing 101 photographs of military, topographical, architectural and sporting subjects in India, Kashmir and Afghanistan was the principal attraction for some in a March 12 sale at Hay-on-Wye held by Y Gelli.

AS a one-off, the spring version of the twice-yearly Cardiff Antiques and Collectors’ Fair decamps to the nearby country town of Cowbridge. Carmarthen-based Robert and Carol Pugh, who operate as Towy Fairs, have been forced out of their regular venue, the Cardiff Bowling Club, by a rather rougher fixture than bowling, the Rugby League Cup Final which will be held at the Millennium Stadium on the same weekend – April 26 and 27.

VETERAN organiser Donald Bayliss, who put together his first fair in the 1960s and now operates out of Ludlow as Continuity Fairs, is launching a new event in mid-Wales in the Spring.

WELSH organisers Robert and Carol Pugh, who operate as Towy Antiques Fairs, finished last year with a flourish when their pre-Christmas Carmarthen Fair at the local showground proved surprisingly successful.

Understandably, the Russians left this one behind when they liberated the Reichstag in 1945, but a Tommy NCO with a sense of humour decided to rescue this beleaguered portrait of the First World War German Field Marshall and Weimar president Paul von Hindenburg, right, from the ruins and take him back to the West Country.

With the recent closure of numerous manufacturing depots belonging to a Cardiff company, the time came to dispose of items from the manager’s flat. The best of these items, all of which were sold on November 20 at the Cardiff rooms of Anthemion Auctions, was this Regency mahogany secretaire bookcase.

FACING up to the decline in demand for brown furniture was the central issue taxing the National Association of Valuers and Auctioneers (NAVA) at their annual general meeting in Cardiff.

THEY LIKE a good sermon in this part of the world and in this September sale, a 1611 (seventh or eighth?) edition of the sermons of Henry Smith, a puritan divine who was known as “silver-tongued Smith”, and whose collected wisdom first appeared in print in 1592, sold at £320 (Humber) in a binding of contemporary calf gilt, while a 350pp manuscript collection of sermons, this time bound in 19th century calf, made £1100 (Lachman).

Like English haggis and Scotch rarebit, the idea of Welsh Whisky is somewhat dubious. A few years ago a Welsh bottling company began to market a product called Welsh Whisky, which won praise from American connoisseurs but was just Scotch whisky in disguise.The company subsequently ceased trading.

As well as providing a venue for pop concerts and motor-cross rallies, Tredegar House is also a favourite location for auctioneers. Last year Sotheby’s used the 16th century estate for their Welsh sale – this year it hosted Phillips auction of The Arts in Wales.

Some 15 years ago figurative painter Claudia Williams (born 1933) and her husband, artist Gwilym Prichard, left North Wales to settle in France. It was not long before they made their mark on the French art scene, their work being represented in many shows and each being awarded the Silver Medal by the Academy of Arts, Science and Letters, Paris in 1995.

A BIBLE was one of several lots that moved into the four-figure range in this summer sale at Y Gelli in Hay on June 8.

UK: STILL relatively new to the auctioneering world as independent auctioneers, the husband and wife team of S.J. Hales (15 per cent buyer’s premium) have already built up a nationwide reputation for Staffordshire and one that was enhanced at their May 30 sale when they could offer this rare early Samuel Alcock porcellaneous pair of leopard groups.

UK: Gathering new business from buyers unable to attend salerooms in Devon and Wales, these Wotton Gloucestershire rooms were one of a small handful to benefit from the foot and mouth plague.

To what extent the bouyant market for Gaudy Welsh pottery would become deflated if every American collector realised it was actually made in Staffordshire, England, not Wales, is a pertinent question – given the misty eyed view of Scottish/Welsh/Irish history from the other side of pond.

Sotheby’s find a warm welcome in Wales with record bid and active museum interest UK: THE strong, and occasionally extraordinary, demand for Celtic art, both Scottish and Irish, has been a feature of the art market for years and has warranted specialist picture sales devoted to those country’s painters.