Christie's

THE Yves Saint Laurent/Pierre Bergé sale mark II was never going to be in the same league as the 374m euros spring extravaganza.

THE latest series of contemporary art auctions in New York provided some further evidence of confidence returning at the top end of the market.

CHRISTIE’S have launched a one-stop insurance service for UK private clients, taking in all their insurance requirements in a single-payment policy package.

AMONG the more run-of-the-mill furnishings that constitute the bulk of the popular Interiors sales at Christie’s South Kensington, there are often a handful of more quirky items.

A DETAILED examination of Laura Knight's 1915 oil Carnaval by Christie's specialist Tom Rooth revealed the edge of not one but two stretched canvases.

THE new auction season kicked off in earnest in New York with one of the strongest market sectors – Asian works of art.

IN January next year, Christie’s are planning to open a high-tech storage facility in New York.

Christie’s have announced a premium-inclusive £1.2bn ($1.8bn) in sales for the first six months of 2009, down 35 per cent on the same period last year, when results were £1.8bn ($3.5bn).

CHRISTIE’S have launched legal action against US Internet entrepreneur Halsey Minor. Minor took Christie’s to court last December, accusing the auction house of fraud and a number of other torts after pictures he consigned to Christie’s dealership Haunch of Venison in May 2008 were not returned “in a timely fashion” when they failed to sell.

In terms of the bottom line, Christie’s latest Hong Kong HK$1.07bn (£83.5m) premium-inclusive Asian series was a far cry from the firm’s record-breaking HK$2.4bn (then £162.2m) extravaganza last year.

CHRISTIE’S Fine Art Storage Services (CFASS) have announced that they will open a new facility at The Singapore Freeport in January 2010, offering a secure tax-free location for the storage and transaction of fine art and antiques.

HE had received only a basic education and spoke only Dutch, but Antoni van Leeuwenhoek (1632-1723) is today recognised as the greatest of the pioneering microscopists of the 17th century.

CHRISTIE’S are to replace a wide range of specialist picture sales with a new sale category incorporating 600 years of traditional Western art. The change will be implemented worldwide from May across their salerooms in London, New York, Milan, Paris and Amsterdam.

CHRISTIE’S have confirmed that their Antiquities department at South Kensington will continue as before, with sales in April and October.

More details have emerged regarding the ‘breach-of-contract’ lawsuit which claims that Christie’s backed out of a $40m guarantee made to secure a Francis Bacon self-portrait for sale.

In a final bid to block the sale of two €28m (£25.4m) imperial bronzes, a Chinese collector revealed himself as the winning bidder and said he had no intention of paying for them.

As befitting a sale with world-famous brand associations, Christie’s dispersal of the Yves Saint Laurent–Pierre Bergé collection in Paris was more like a rock concert or fashion show than an auction.

CHRISTIE’S year-end results for 2008 show that Europe, including the UK, is currently their premier global market in terms of sales, with a total of £1.24bn compared to £1.02bn in the United States.

Fittingly for a man whose career started in the 1930s, last week's sale of the Roger Warner collection at Christie's South Kensington was just like old times.

The death last year aged 98 of Roger Warner brought to a close the long career of one of the last old school eclectic but knowledgeable country dealers.