Old Masters

While many US museums display portraits of famous Patriots from the War of Independence, especially the likes of George Washington, Alexander Hamilton and Nathanael Greene, pictures of Loyalists are less common in their collections.

Since its inception, the focus of the 'Highlights' fair on Modern and Contemporary art has increased and in recent years photography dealers have also been given more space.

The private collector who consigned a painting he had bought at Sotheby’s in London in 2013 to Koller (25/22/15% buyer’s premium) in Zurich for the auction on September 23 will have been most agreeably surprised by the result.

A little-known theatrical portrait painted by Johan Zoffany (1733-1810) towards the end of his career sold for £330,000 at auction in Dorset.

Depictions of north Africa and the Middle East became commonplace in Western art as the Orientalist art movement reached its height in the 19th century.

Titled 'De Watteau à Vuillard Une Collection Parisienne', paintings, works on paper, furniture and objects from a Parisian collection were the object of the first of two single-owner classic contents sales marking the start of the new auction season for the Old Master, furniture and objects departments at Artcurial (26/20/14.5% buyer’s premium).

An early 17th century gouache by the German artist Johann König (1586-1642) was a highlight of the Ivoire Troyes (24% buyer’s premium) auction.

Dickinson Gallery’s managing director Emma Ward and James Roundell have left to set up a firm with Old Master specialist Fabrizio Moretti.

A single-owner sale of property from a Parisian collection will be on offer at Artcurial in Paris on September 21.

An unframed painting offered at a Norfolk auction was bid to 2000 times its high estimate when bidders detected in it the hand of an Italian Old Master.

Sotheby’s (25/20/13.9% buyer’s premium plus 1% overhead premium) latest Old Master evening sale in London was the smallest in terms of the number of lots that anyone could remember at one of these flagship summer events.

A portrait of a young man once thought to be a self-portrait by the Milanese artist Andrea Solario (1460-1524) attracted keen enquiries ahead of sale.

Among a number of Old Master portraits on offer in Cambridge is a depiction of a gentleman that has been consigned from a private collection in Suffolk.

Arguably the most eyecatching bidding battle at the latest London Old Master series was for a painting of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.