A prototype edition of the Quotations of Chairman Mao Tse-Tung, the Little Red Book, comes for sale a Chiswick Auctions estimated at £30,000-35,000.
A scarce prototype edition of the Quotations of Chairman Mao Tse-Tung, the famous Little Red Book, comes for sale in London this month.
It forms part of a one of the world’s largest and best private collections of Cultural Revolution artefacts that will be sold by Chiswick Auctions as part of the February 29 sale of Chinese Revolutionary Art & Literature.
The early imprint of Mao’s Little Red Book was produced in August 1963, some 10 months before the official Beijing version was released in May 1964. Compiled and printed by in the Shenyang Military Region, it numbers 156pp rather than 250pp and lacks the engraved portrait of the Chairman or the slogan Worker of the world, Unite! that became integral to the finished edition. It includes quotation texts by Mao from as early as 1937 into the 1940s.
A book never previously seen at auction, it is offered at this west London sale in its original white paper wrappers with a guide of £30,000-35,000.
This is one of several rare editions of the Quotations included in the collection that was compiled over 25 years by the renowned New York antiquarian book dealer and children’s book specialist Justin Schiller. His home in upstate New York includes many thousands of objects related to the Cultural Revolution, many of them bought during regular visits to China.
Dore & Rees is holding a sale titled Property of a Gentleman in Hong Kong in conjunction with local firm Argent. This marble figure of a bathing nymph by Jules Blanchard is estimated at HK$120,000-150,000.
On February 27 Frome auction house Dore & Rees is holding a sale titled Property of a Gentleman in Hong Kong in conjunction with local firm Argent.
The first of a three-part dispersal (the other sales will be held in March and April) offers 60 lots including this marble figure of a bathing nymph by Jules Blanchard, signed & dated for 1874 (height 6ft 9in/2.05m).
A rare surviving example of the artist’s work in marble on a grand scale, it was acquired at Christie’s in 2009 and is estimated here at HK$120,000-150,000.
Medals awarded to a Croydon doctor who won an MBE for his lifesaving work during the Blitz after being decorated in the trenches during the First World War are for sale at South Dorsetshire Auctions estimated at £600-800.
Medals awarded to a Croydon doctor who won an MBE for his lifesaving work during the Blitz after being decorated in the trenches during the First World War are for sale at South Dorsetshire Auctions of Wareham on February 25.
Dr Horatio Sparling lived on Dingwall Road, East Croydon, and was the local divisional surgeon for the St John’s Ambulance before volunteering as a medical officer with the Civil Defence organisation at the beginning of the Second World War despite being too old for active service in the military.
Medals awarded to a Croydon doctor who won an MBE for his lifesaving work during the Blitz after being decorated in the trenches during the First World War are for sale at South Dorsetshire Auctions estimated at £600-800.
He was awarded the MBE after being dangled by his ankles in a house damaged by a German V1 flying bomb so he could set fractures and give painkilling injections to those trapped within despite the risk of the rest of the building collapsing and taking him with it. Newspaper clippings which come with the medals detailing numerous acts of bravery by Dr Sparling as Croydon became the most-bombed borough in England by the rocket-powered ‘Doodlebugs’.
His medals from both conflicts have been consigned by a relative of his former housekeeper to whom they were left when he died in 1965 at the age of 77.
Estimate £600-800.
This oil on panel portrait by Midge Bruford signed and dated 1930 is estimated at £1500-2500 at Lay’s.
Midge Bruford (1902-58) was part of the Cornwall artistic circle that included Dod Proctor, Harold Harvey and Richard Weatherby (to whom she was engaged for several years and shared a studio).
She died from a mysterious disease, thought by her family and friends to have been caught from a monkey she rescued from a travelling organ grinder.
This oil on panel portrait signed and dated 1930 depicts Lizzie Annie Hocking, the daughter of Bruford’s cleaning lady who grew up to become a cook in the Lamorna area.
Estimated at £1500-2500, it is one of the many fine Cornish 20th century pictures from the art collection of Pep and John Branfield for sale on February 29 at Lays in Penzance. It was exhibited as part of the travelling Women Artists in Cornwall 1880-1940, held at Falmouth Art Gallery, Plymouth Art Gallery and latterly Penlee House Art Gallery in 2002.
John Branfield is the author of several biographies about some of west Cornwall’s most celebrated artistic figures. Over the past 50 years, he and his late wife collected some 200 paintings and ceramics by Cornish artists (see News, ATG No 2617).
George II silver gilt=mounted porcelain sweet basket, estimate £800-1200 at Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood.
The silver and jewellery sale at Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood in Exeter on February 27-28 includes this George II silver gilt-mounted porcelain sweet basket.
Fashioned c.1750 using a Kangxi period blanc de chine libation cup, the rocaille mounts with a swing handle chased as confronting beast heads carry the maker’s mark only of John Harvey I who registered it in 1739.
Estimate £800-1200.
Athens AR Tetradrachm, estimate £450-650 at Fellows.
The Monies, Medals & Militaria sale at Fellows in Birmingham on February 29 includes this Athens AR Tetradrachm estimated at £450-650.
French clock c.1875 carrying a stamped AM beehive trademark for François Arsène Margaine, estimate £2500-3500 at Dreweatts.
This French clock c.1875 carries a stamped AM beehive trademark for François Arsène Margaine. Housed in a 6in (15cm) shield-shaped case is a mid-sized eight-day, two-train gong striking movement with a repeating alarm mechanism.
It is expected to bring £2500-3500 as part of the horology and scientific instruments sale at Dreweatts in Newbury on February 27.
Comic Book Auctions is offering the first 50 issues of The Topper (1953-54) in a bound volume, estimated at £800-1200.
Comic Book Auctions is offering the first 50 issues of The Topper (1953-54) in a bound volume “in the high grades of Fine-Very Fine”. The auction house says: “Normally large format comics like The Topper do not survive in very good condition but these issues are the highest grades to be offered at auction.”
The Topper heralded the humorous antics of Mickey The Monkey, Beryl The Peril and Flip McCoy The Floating Boy, with Treasure Island and Kidnapped back page adventure strips by illustrator Dudley Watkins.
These comics are part of The Woodard Archive of British Comics, a collection painstakingly put together over a 40-year period and “scrupulously upgraded” during that time. They are estimated at £800-1200 in CBA’s timed online sale closing on February 25.
A single-owner collection of medals is on offer at Charterhouse, including a rare Air Force Cross, estimate £2000-3000.
A single-owner collection of medals is on offer in the Charterhouse three-day auction in Sherborne, Dorset, on February 28-March 1.
The owner of the medals, who lives near Dorchester, started collecting in the early 1950s where he paid pennies for some of them. Medals in the collection date from the mid-19th century to the Korean War and include gallantry to coronation medals.
It comprises 220 lots in the sale and top-estimated item, at £2000-3000, is a group of medals awarded to an officer in the RAF which includes a rare Air Force Cross (pictured).
Linthorpe mustard-glazed sake bottle c.1880 with a facsimile signature for Christopher Dresser, estimate at £500-800 at Tennants.
Tennants’ March 2 sale of Decorative Arts includes the Dr John Yule collection of Linthorpe and other Middlesbrough pottery. This Linthorpe mustard-glazed sake bottle c.1880 with a facsimile signature for Christopher Dresser is guided at £500-800.
Abstract artwork by Duncan Grant thought to depict his lover, artist Vanessa Bell, and their daughter Angelica, estimate £6000-8000 at Hansons.
This abstract artwork by Duncan Grant (1885-1978) is thought to capture his lover, fellow Bloomsbury Set artist Vanessa Bell, and their daughter Angelica.
The oil on canvas, (59 x 48.5cm), signed lower right, will be offered at Hansons’ Staffordshire saleroom Bishton Hall on February 23 with a guide of £6000-8000.
Grant, a Scottish painter and designer of textiles, pottery, theatre sets, met Bell (1879-1961), a painter, designer and sister of celebrated English writer Virginia Woolf, through the Bloomsbury Group, or Bloomsbury Set.
Though Vanessa married Clive Bell in 1907 and had two sons with him, they had an open marriage. Vanessa had affairs with art critic Roger Fry as well as Grant, with whom she had Angelica in 1918.
Vanessa, Clive, Duncan, and Duncan’s lover David Garnett moved to the Sussex countryside shortly before the outbreak of the First World War, and settled at Charleston Farmhouse near Firle, East Sussex.
Hansons said: “The painting has emerged from a private collection. It has been in private hands for most of its life. If is does capture Vanessa and daughter Angelica around the age of five, it can be dated to c.1923.”
Test model of a Hawk jet was manufactured during the 1980s at British Aerospace, Brough, East Yorkshire, offered without an estimate but an opening price of £300 at Hawley’s.
This test model of a Hawk jet was manufactured during the 1980s at British Aerospace, Brough, East Yorkshire. It was created to measure the effects of carrying external stores (missiles, pylons, rockets, fuel tanks etc) with different configurations in a high-speed wind tunnel.
Made of aluminium and steel on a 1:28 scale, the lot also includes a spare aluminium nose cone and the end section of a sting (used for holding the model in the wind tunnel). The 15½in long x 13in wide (39 x 33cm) wide model has been painted red and mounted. It is offered without an estimate but an opening price of £300 at Hawley’s auction house in Beverley, East Yorkshire, on February 23-24.
The vendor worked on these models as part of the engineering team and three other lots on the same theme are on offer.
