Christie's

TWO weeks after Sotheby’s raised their buyer’s premium rates for their premier salerooms, Christie’s have matched them. Both companies now charge 19.5% on the first $100,000 and 10 per cent thereafter.

While Pelé’s shirt received nearly all the post-sale plaudits, it wasn’t the only piece of football history to go under the hammer at Christie’s South Kensington (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) last week, and CSK was not the only London room offering a sale of football memorabilia.

Other auction houses may soon have to follow suit: Concern over the possibility of conflicts of interest has put Christie’s review of their policy on the use of outside consultants at the top of the company’s agenda.

Christie’s and Sotheby’s may not have had a vintage New York Asian Art series this March, but private and trade buyers continued to compete for the best quality fresh-to-the-market entries.

In the week when the death was announced of Kenneth Wolstenholme – the man whose legendary utterance “They think it’s all over... it is now!” capped England’s 1966 World Cup win – what could have been more appropriate than a world record for a football shirt at auction.

SHORT of George Washington’s ‘cherry tree’ axe (or, possibly, his cherrywood teeth) this set of binoculars is probably the most poignant of US Presidential personal possessions.

Look at the differences between the modern-day perspective of Amsterdam’s Nieuw Voorburgwaal, and the 1759 depiction by Dutch artist Jan de Beyer (c.1703-85) to be offered for sale from the Anton Dressman collection at Christie’s Amsterdam on April 16 with an estimate of €45,000-75,000.

VINTAGE FILM POSTERS: Cult film classics such as Flash Gordon, The Mummy and Dr X may no longer be the crowd-pullers they once were, but these cinematic greats live on through their original advertising posters.

TIM Hirsch, managing director of Spink, has succeeded in leading a management buy-out of the firm from Christie’s.

WILLIAM Wood’s New Englands Prospect..., first published in London in 1634, was intended to “enrich the knowledge of the mind-travelling Reader, or benefit the future Voyager”.

CHRISTIE’S led worldwide auction sales in 2001, with a total of £1.242bn compared to Sotheby’s £1.14bn for the same period.

Christie’s (20.93/11.96% buyer’s premium) staged their first Automobile sale in Paris on February 12 at the Rétromobile vintage car show, which attracts 100,000 visitors every year.

NEW YORK: MARINE paintings are a specialist area which have received plenty of attention from auction houses eager to tap into the wealth of those rich enough to enjoy mucking around in boats.

SILVER: Good commercially appealing entries were what was finding favour with both trade and private buyers at Christie’s South Kensington’s second silver sale of the year, the 158-lot £136,123 gathering held on February 19.

HOLLAND: IN honour of the Netherlands’ long tradition of landscapes and town scenes Christie’s Amsterdam (buyer’s premium 20.825 per cent) had a topographical theme to its pictures sale on January 22.

THE relative strength of Old Master paintings in comparison to other sectors of the market has been noted at a number of recent auctions, but this new-found strength, it seems, is not just restricted to top-end sales in London and New York.

Transferring fine vintage wines from the bottle to the decanter without disturbing the sediment has been an age-old concern of those who take their wine seriously. It was clearly a concern in the 18th century, as can be attested by this ingenious and now rare George II silver wine syphon, right, which came under the hammer at Christie’s South Kensington’s (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) February 19 sale of Selected Silver and Plate.

CHRISTIE’S have announced that they have been instructed by the Marquess of Bath and his trustees to sell 400 lots of paintings and works of art from Longleat House. The aim is to raise over £15m to set up a maintenance fund for its preservation.

Post-War sales at Christie’s (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) tend to be more predictable, less mercurial events than their cool contemporary outings and the established reputations of the artists invariably guarantee a procession of solid six-figure results.

Against the background of the London Impressionist, Modern and Contemporary sales both the major auction players held specialist Surrealist evening sales – Christie’s (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) on February 4 and Sotheby’s (20/15/10% buyer’s premium) on the following evening of February 5.