News

A series of blue-chip consignments from different sectors of the market helped Christie’s ‘Defining British Art’ evening sale in London last night to a £99.5m total including premium. The auction offered paintings by major names including Joshua Reynolds, John Constable, Stanley Spencer, Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon but it was a Henry Moore sculpture that led proceedings, selling at £22m.

Crowning the white-glove success of Japanese works from the Portier collection in Paris was the sale of this signature portrait print by Kitagawa Utamaro for €600,000 (£500,000).

BADA have joined with the Federation of Small Business (FSB) to research how much art and antique dealers are helped by the government’s proposed rate relief on properties – if at all.

A number of St James’s dealers have chosen to relocate their premises in the face of extensive refurbishment plans on the part of Crown Estates.

Wellers Fine Art Ltd will continue to hold monthly sales of jewellery and watches in Guildford, despite the liquidation of a separate commercial operation.

A dispute has erupted between fair organisers in Florida over a new event being launched in Palm Beach next January.

Two paintings by Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988) consigned to auction by the actor Johnny Depp sold for a combined £7.6m at Christie’s evening sale of post-war and Contemporary art last night.