Ceramics

A small collection of 18th century European porcelain offered by Reeman Dansie in Colchester included this Meissen teapot and cover c.1725.

The great Hungarian love affair with Zsolnay Pec ceramics goes on, most recently witnessed in the East Sussex rooms of Burstow & Hewett (15% buyer’s premium) when 27 lots were offered.

Three 19th century porcelain figures from a Peoples of Russia series consigned to Lincoln auction house Golden Young & Mawer (20% buyer’s premium) by a local vendor attracted interest from the US to Russia.

Outsold, predictably enough, by an 18th-19th century Chinese vase, two late 19th century Persian moulded pottery tiles were the eye-catchers among a buoyant Asian works of art section at Billingshurst auction house Bellmans (22% buyer’s premium).

Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood of Exeter plans to hold its first-ever 20th century and contemporary art and design sale later this month.

When Bill Kime, senior decorative arts specialist at the Waddington’s (20% buyer’s premium) saleroom, was contacted early last year by a couple from British Columbia about selling their collection of Martinware, he jumped at the chance.

Leading Roseberys’ inaugural stand-alone sale of 20th century decorative arts on January 23 – the first under new head of department Fiona Baker – was this large Art Deco ceramic vase and cover (right) by the important French Art Deco ceramicist René Buthaud (1886-1986).

MADAM – I thought your readers might like to know that grant funding is available for anyone doing research that includes printing on British ceramics.

A specialist fair in London that was put together at top speed in under two weeks, with Christmas in the middle, has been judged a resounding success by the organiser Two C’s Fairs.

Alan Blakeman, lifelong rock climber and founder of niche business BBR Auctions in Elsecar, near Barnsley, had a good 2017.

A long-running biannual specialist fair has been renamed and will launch its first edition in London under a new organiser this month.

Two pre-Christmas sales, one at Woolley & Wallis (22% buyer’s premium) in Salisbury and one at Mallams (20% buyer’s premium) in Oxford, highlighted the move of studio pottery from esoteric niche into the mainstream market.

Jason Jacques’ eponymous Manhattan gallery specialises in art pottery, especially works from the 19th century and Art Nouveau period and work by modern studio potters. It is exhibiting for the first time this year at the 'Winter Antiques Show' in New York.

The late Gerald and Brenda Flowerday caught the collecting bug in the late 1960s, igniting a keen interest in 18th century English ceramics that would last for the next 40 years.