Christie's

Members of the trade still looking for a suitable holiday destination could do worse than consider Pirate’s Cove on Cocos Island, the subject of this Montague Dawson oil on canvas, 3ft 4in by 4ft 2in, which appeared at Christie’s Maritime sale in New York on July 31.

The demand for the best of Louis Comfort Tiffany’s studio glass continued apace at Christie’s (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) 86-lot Important 20th century Decorative Arts including Works by Tiffany Studios, June 7.

A well-wrapped and padded pair of boxing gloves are essential, one would think, for victory in the ring. But arguably it was the defective nature of the left hand glove, pictured here, which gave Cassius Clay his win over Henry Cooper in 1963, after letting him off the hook.

UK: Christie’s Continental Furniture sale on July 4 (17.5/10% buyer's premium) included a small nine-lot section devoted to Neapolitan piqué work: tortoiseshell objects inlaid with mother-of-pearl and silver, which proved decidedly popular.

UK: A week of exhibitions and sales of Old Master drawings reached its zenith on July 10 when this miniature silverpoint sketch by Leonardo da Vinci appeared at Christie’s King Street.

UK: Sold for £48,000 to Quaritch at Christie’s on June 4& 6 was a recently rediscovered manuscript of William Gilpin’s book on Forest Scenery... (first published in 1791) that fills four volumes and contains 25 full and 20 half-page watercolour drawings by Gilpin, plus three pencil and wash drawings of animals by his brother Sawrey.

An incomplete copy of one of the masterpieces of English botanical illustration of the 19th century, Mrs Edward Berry’s Selection of Hexandrian Plants (1831-34), offered at Christie’s on June 4 & 6 contained only 45 (of 51) of the younger Robert Havell’s partially colour-printed and hand-finished engraved and aquatinted plates, but it brought a bid of £60,000 from the Oppenheimer Gallery.

For last November’s Asia series Christie’s South Kensington (17.5/10 per cent buyer’s premium) switched from holding mammoth mixed Oriental offerings to more specialised separate Chinese and Japanese sales – an arrangement they continued for the summer Asian sales last month.

Now that we cannot take what is left of our public services for granted, it is worth remembering that municipal fire brigades have only existed nationwide since 1938. When private brigades were the norm, the residents of towns and cities had to rely on firemen employed by private insurance companies, resulting in the bizarre sight of Commercial Union/Sun Life/Phoenix firemen idling in front of a blazing building insured by a rival company.

This dramatic theatrical costume for a warrior in yellow satin with gilt thread and silk embroidery took the top price in a sale of Asian Costume and Textiles held by Christie’s South Kensington on June 21.

The London art market breathed a general sigh of relief last week after Sotheby’s and Christie’s Part I Impressionist and Modern sales belied the atmosphere of economic uncertainty with a clutch of high prices for classic works by the major names of late 19th and early 20th century art.

UK: CHRISTIE'S South Kensington (15/10 per cent buyer’s premium) chalked up another strong result to add to their successful run of mixed- and single-owner Staffordshire pottery auctions with the sale on June 14 of 273 lots from the Oxfordshire dealer Robin Sanders and Sons. A selection that also took in blue and white pearlware and ironstone tablewares but majored on Staffordshire figures, it saw all but 13 lots change hands netting £145,000.

UK: THE market for travel posters is particularly strong with Christie's South Kensington frequently holding specialised sales. Another London house, Onslows (15/10 per cent buyer’s premium), of Fulham relished in the strength of posters at their sale at The Carisbrooke Hall, Marble Arch from May 16-17 when this advert, right, for Bournemouth designed by H.G. Gawthron in 1930 went over estimate.

UK: TOPPING Christie’s June 14 English furniture sale at £420,000 was this pair of marble-topped side tables attributed to the Cobb and Vile partnership.

UK: EARLY German drinking vessels captured all the attention and big money in Christie’s June 13 sale of silver.

CHRISTIE’S are preparing to sell all subsidiary companies currently operating under the Spink name. PricewaterhouseCooper have been instructed to handle the disposal of their Spink assets, which are likely to fall into four separate entities.

AUSTRALIA: A COLLECTION of classic 18th century English and German porcelain gave a flying start to Christie’s Australia’s (17.5/10 per cent buyer’s premium) mammoth 575-lot, mixed-owner auction of Decorative Arts in Melbourne on May 28-29.

THE bulk of the 208-lot Irish sale held at Christie’s South Kensington (17.5% buyer’s premium) on May 17 was middle-to-low range material from the studio of the late painter, socialite and friend of the Prince of Wales Derek Hill (1916-2000) but it produced the busiest saleroom expert-in-charge William Porter had seen for a picture sale.

Apart from a few isolated surprises for cult rarities, Sotheby’s and Christie’s recent wine sales on both sides of the Atlantic bore out this sense of a market in a state of suspended animation.

UK: At over 300 lots, Christie's South Kensington’s modern design auction on May 16 was a large and wide ranging gathering, (it would have been even larger had the auctioneers not withdrawn a 17-lot collection of Italian glass).