Ceramics

The Decades of Design sale at Fieldings (24% buyer’s premium inc VAT) in Stourbridge on October 15-16 included 52 works from the family of Albert Wainwright (1898-1943). He was a Castleford artist who trained at the Leeds School of Art in 1914.

The Tavistock Pannier Market may well see an influx of sleeper-hunters following the canny purchase in June of a piece described as ‘a Cornish tile’.

A number of six-figure prices for rare and interesting items were achieved when French auction house Rouillac (24% buyer’s premium inc VAT) staged its 32nd Garden Party sale.

Robert Aronson runs Dutch family business Aronson Anitquairs, which launched in 1881 and today specialises in Delftware.

The most desirable of the varied wares produced by the small ceramics factory established by Vilmos Zsolnay (1828-1900) in the south-west Hungarian town of Pecs are those created after the 1890s.

A recent sale at Byrne’s (17.5% buyer’s premium) in Chester included 22 lustre wares by the Staffordshire art potter and chemist Bernard Moore.

More than 700 lots of Decorative Arts and Design spanning the 19th through to the early years of this century were offered for sale by Woolley & Wallis (25/12% buyer’s premium) in Salisbury over two days.

This William de Morgan six-tile panel from c.1880 will feature in a two-day sale, Decorative Arts: Design since 1860, at Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh on November 2-3.

Topping a 360-lot, £242,000 single-owner collection of Martinware and Moorcroft at Kingham & Orme (23% buyer’s premium) was a Robert Wallace Martin grotesque bird.

A large 13th century Persian lustre tile sold for £80,000 (plus 25% buyer’s premium) at John Nicholson’s in Haslemere.

Coadestone urns to this design were a personal favourite of company founder Eleanor Coade herself.

The 'Indian Sporting' series is the most celebrated of all Spode blue and white transfer-prints. This multi-scene pattern (there are 17 different designs in total) is based on aquatints by Samuel Howitt from 'Oriental Field Sports, Wild Sports of the East' by Captain Thomas Williamson, published in 1807.

Brought back to England by 19th century travel writer Richard Ford, a carved alabaster relief of the Madonna watching over Christ was the outstanding lot from a Gloucestershire country house offered at Mallams Cheltenham (22.5% buyer’s premium).

Pre-emption, the right of a French museum or institution to step in at the fall of the gavel to claim a lot at auctions staged in France for purchase at the hammer price, is a common occurence in such sales.

Estimated at £7000-10,000, this very rare Bow model of a red squirrel, c.1760-65, sold for £20,000 at Bonhams’ (27.5/25% buyer’s premium) Fine Ceramics and Glass sale in Knightsbridge on September 29.

Two pieces of Moorcroft Pomegranate pattern made exceptional sums within a matter of 24 hours at the end of September. Both were early versions of the popular pattern and dated 1912 – the year William Moorcroft left his studio at James Macintyre to run his own factory in Cobridge.

Further pieces from English porcelain specialist’s collection are among highlights in Lewes.

London ceramics dealer and Swedish Nordic design specialist team up for joint show

On October 31, Quentin in Berlin is holding its 40th auction. One of the most unusual pieces is this 8in (22cm) high satirical porcelain figure, titled Schmeichelei (Flattery). It was modelled in 1909 by the Slovakian artist Eduard Klabena for KPM in Berlin.