Dealers

THIS letter from the Deputy Leader of Kensington and Chelsea Council Daniel Moylan appeared in ATG issue no. 1939, May 8.

LONDON dealers Wartski are holding a loan exhibition at their Grafton Street Gallery from May 11-21 titled The King's Blood: Relics of King Charles I.

THE Greek courts have agreed not to pursue dealer Malcolm Hay any further pending his appeal against his conviction for trading in stolen antiquities.

NEW York art gallery Berry-Hill have had a number of artworks seized after a judge ruled it had defaulted on a $9.5m loan.

SINCE the last ATG conference in May 2009, the vision that Nigel Worboys outlined is now a reality, with many businesses following his lead.

SPEAKING to ATG at the end of last week, London Old Master dealer Johnny Van Haeften still had not actually seen the monumental painting by Frans Francken II (1581-1642) for which he paid 6.1m euros (£5.65m) at Dorotheum’s Old Master sale in Vienna on April 21.

It was in October 2007 that I was personally able to break the news to Costas Kleanthous that Kensington and Chelsea Council had decided to effectively create an enclave in Portobello for small shops which could act as a blueprint for other shopping and tourist destinations across Britain.

THE people of Portobello cheered at Kensington and Chelsea town hall as their local councillor demanded an investigation into “what could prove an absolute scandal” concerning the development site that now houses the local All Saints store.

A MANUSCRIPTS dealer from Cheltenham has uncovered a major theft of letters from an American university. The case is now being investigated by the FBI.

DISGRACED New York dealer Lawrence Salander, erstwhile co-owner of Manhattan’s Salander-O’Reilly Gallery, has admitted to orchestrating a $120m art fraud.

THE Portobello Road antiques trade have suffered another blow after the shutters finally came down on a long-established Saturday market. The early morning Good Fairy Market closed in the first week of March with no indication given that it will reopen as an antiques market.

THE public protest over the replacement of antiques shops in Portobello by fashion stores and other chains is gathering pace.

ACTION Comics ushered in the age of superheroes when its first issue hit the news stands in June 1938. On its cover was a curious character dressed in skintight blue and red lifting a green Chevrolet above his head, and the course of American pop culture was changed forever.

A DEALER who says his career has been ruined by trumped-up charges in the Greek courts has been arrested again – even though he is currently appealing against the conviction and three-year jail sentence.

WHEN the ‘To Let’ signs in the windows at the former Partridge Fine Art gallery on Bond Street were removed earlier this month, and ‘Let’ signs took their place, rumours abounded as to who the new tenants might be.

SEVERAL dealers at Sunbury Antiques Market at Kempton Park on Tuesday, January 26, were duped by a woman using a stolen chequebook.

A GROUP of Portobello Road dealers are to lobby the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea following the loss of a prominent antiques arcade to a highstreet retailer.

THE work of Edward Seago (1910-1974) has always been popular. Even during his own lifetime, Colnaghi’s annual exhibitions of his paintings between 1946 and 1966 on Old Bond Street drew such fierce competition that buyers, some of whom had queued overnight, were restricted to one picture each.

ANOTHER major dealership on the London antiques scene is to close with the announcement of the auction of the entire trading stock of Sampson and Horne Antiques at Bonhams on April 28.

MARK Law, former chairman of Partridge, has joined former directors David Mellor and Christopher Jemmett in their bid to remove their guarantor status relating to the purchase of the firm.