Old Masters

Stand-out lots from upcoming sales including Chardin still-life, Napoleonic marshal's baton and fine art collection acquired over decades

A round-up of art and antiques news from the previous seven days, including news of George Stubbs' 'Mares and Foals' being offered at auction with a £7m-10m estimate.

Current collecting taste means that Old Master paintings exploring the darker side of the human character can often find more admirers than more typical subject matter of Georgian gentleman or European landscapes. Works of the grotesque are particularly popular.

Venetian painter sometimes used studio assistants

In 2018, British watercolours and drawings specialist Lowell Libson made the unusual move of adding a name, that of Jonny Yarker, to that of his self-titled business.

An old label on the back of a Medway view that emerged in Germany gave a tantalising suggestion that the British artist John Constable was involved.

A ‘lost’ late 16th century portrait miniature by Italian painter Lavinia Fontana (1552-1614) has been rediscovered by an art dealer.

A monumental painting of an Old Testament subject, which came to auction in a gloomy state, drew a remarkable bidding battle at a West Sussex sale.

The personal art collection of film director and intellectual Pierre Rouve (1915-98), kept in his Chelsea house until he died, will be offered at auction.

A recent Brunk’s (23% buyer’s premium) auction in Asheville, North Carolina, included a group of six small oil-on-copper mythological scenes by Neapolitan painter Luca Giordano (1634-1705).

Two prominent single-owner collections put together into a single Town & Country sale at Dreweatts generated some decent if selective bidding when it came to the pictures on offer.