Sotheby's

CHRISTIE’S established 15 new auction records at their Rockefeller Centre saleroom on the evening of May 14 with a $42.1m (£29.9m) sale of Post-War and Contemporary Art.

SOTHEBY’S results for the first quarter of 2002 show a 20 per cent drop in revenues – no great surprise following September 11 and smaller London Impressionist and Contemporary sales.

The late Clive Sherwood bought this imposing Elizabethan oak tester bed at Sotheby’s in London in 1969. By all accounts he had to sell all his silver to raise the cash, but he was still buying early oak at a time when it was possible to buy in bulk and learn from your mistakes.

Sotheby’s quadruple recent results and Christie’s celebrate boost too: Barely a month after its former chairman and chief executive were sentenced in a New York court, Sotheby’s bounced back in their Manhattan saleroom on May 8 with a $126m (£88.7m) Part I auction of Impressionist and Modern Art.

Although all the other sales that used to be held at Sotheby’s Billingshurst have now moved to their Olympia rooms*, the one notable exception is their twice-yearly auctions of garden statuary and architectural items. These continue to be held in West Sussex where they can benefit from Billingshurst’s location for a stylish viewing in their country house grounds.

Former Sotheby’s chief executive Diana ‘Dede’ Brooks was sentenced to six months ‘home detention’ last Monday after pleading guilty to fixing commissions for vendors with Christie’s between 1993 and 1999.

The former chairmen of Sotheby’s and Christie’s faced different but equally humiliating fates last week following the auction house price-fixing scandal.

One of the main preoccupations of the 19th century art potters – and a distinguishing feature of much of their work – is an emphasis on hand crafting and experimental work and an interest in the techniques and glazes of earlier periods.

The European Commission announced last week that they intend to take action against Sotheby’s and Christie’s regarding a whole range of anti-competitive practices.

NEW YORK: They say that sex sells, but it would be wrong to assume this was the only attraction of this 18th century Indian illustration to the Gita Govinda, Krishna and Radha Make Love, 1775-1780, 101/8in by 61/8in (25.7cm x15.6cm).

There were auction highs and lows during New York’s March Asia week that saw Sotheby’s (20/15/10% buyer’s premium) and Christie’s (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) hosting eight sales in four days, from March 19-22.

THE FIRST oak and country sale of 2002 for Sotheby’s Olympia (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) took place on March 26 with just over 300 lots of furniture, metalware and decorative works of art and a smattering of textiles.

Pop star Dave Stewart has a ‘garage’ sale…: Two Sotheby’s sales, one in London the other in New York, will provide plentiful fodder for design-hungry fanatics on either side of the pond next month.

On May 17-18, Sotheby’s New York rooms are mounting a sale entitled By Design which features furnishings that have either been designed or selected for decorative schemes by leading interior designers.

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.

SOTHEBY’S former chairman, A. Alfred Taubman, convicted in December of conspiring with rival auction house Christie’s to fix fees charged to sellers, must now wait until April 22 for sentencing.

When Sotheby’s sold the second and third parts of Sotheby’s sale of the Jammes collection in Paris on March 21 and 22, the highest price was paid, as expected, for this exceptional collection of correspondence from the French father of photography, Nicéphore Niépce, and his son Isidore, featuring a heliographic reproduction of a Dutch print.

Above right: the ‘Library’ portion of the Ken Paul Collection, a three-day sale of ‘antique’ film props that raised £1.5m at Sotheby’s last month was not large and was dispersed in eight job lots, but someone will doubtless have fun sorting through this collection of several hundred deeds, wills, leases, probates, transfers etc., mostly on vellum and largely 19th century, but including a few made-up props.

KEN PAUL COLLECTION: This bizarre late-19th century mahogany longcase timepiece, right fashioned as a coffin and containing a human skeleton, was the most extraordinary offering in what was itself a highly unusual sale held by Sotheby’s (20/15/10% buyer’s premium) in Bond Street from March 13-15.

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.