Fairs and Markets

MORE worthwhile activity from our busy and productive local dealers’ associations which have surely proved their worth now, even to traditionally independent sceptics. As the stalwarts of the Cotswolds Antique Dealers’ Association wrap up their series of exhibitions, the equally industrious members of the Thames Valley Antique Dealers’ Association prepare for their autumn fair.

An early autumn mixed hors d’oeuvres of silver and European ceramics went under the hammer at Sotheby’s Olympia (20/12% buyer’s premium) on October 2. Roughly two-thirds of the 375 lots were devoted to silver and vertu, and the remaining third to ceramics, but it was the latter that provided half of the ten highest prices, including what proved to be very much the top lot of the day.

APPLICATIONS from dealers to join the first National Fine Art and Antiques Fair, to be held at Birmingham’s National Exhibition Centre next year from January 28 to February 1, already suggest that this could be a major player on the national fairs scene.

HAVING run antique furniture businesses in Hampshire and the Midlands, Max Salisbury upped sticks two years ago to make his fortune in North Carolina. Looking at events in America over the past two years his timing could not have been worse, but now he has successfully established a business at 1102 North Main Street, High Point (Tel: +1 336 883 1494) where he displays his speciality – expertly re-upholstered 19th century English furniture in “natural and uncluttered” room settings.

The fair with the best chance of giving New York and the trade a much-needed lift: I REMEMBER clearly two years ago in the wake of the 9/11 attacks in Manhattan one of the most severe tests for the international trade was the cancellation of London organisers Brian and Anna Haughton’s International Fine Art and Antique Dealers Show, America’s top antiques fair.

ONE never associates the Chelsea Antiques Fair with thronged aisles and a rush of business, but after more than half a century it must be doing a lot right and the 97th staging from September 17 to 22 at the Old Town Hall in the King’s Road, SW3, did not disappoint most of the 35 exhibitors.

September was football time for two of the London rooms, Sotheby’s Olympia (20/10% buyer’s premium) fielded a 437-lot sale on September 11 and Christie’s South Kensington (17.5/10% buyer’s premium), who followed on two weeks later with their 302-lot offering on September 23.

CHIPPING Norton, Oxfordshire dealers Jane and Keith Riley, who trade as Key Antiques at 11 Horsefair, go back to their roots for their contribution to the Cotswolds Antique Dealers’ Association’s series of selling exhibitions.

CHESHIRE remains a favoured county for fair organisers and Somerset-based Cooper Antiques Fairs are no exception, their premier event in the north being The Cheshire County Antiques Fair, held three times a year at Arley Hall, near Knutsford.

WITH an exhibitor list well down on last year, Essex organiser Robert Bailey’s 53rd Northern Antiques Fair at Harrogate from September 17 to 21 did not enjoy a vintage staging, with a number of exhibitors expressing disappointment at the attendance and general level of business.

Association to work with Bailey Fairs: LAPADA fairs are to continue both in London and the provinces but with new venues and new organisers, it has been announced. From next year for their London showcase the UK’s largest antiques association move into Mayfair and from April 14 to 18 launch The Claridge’s LAPADA Art and Antiques Fair at the exclusive Claridge’s Hotel in Brook Street, W1.

REGIONAL dealers’ associations have become an integral part of the British trade over the past couple of decades and the first of them, the one that set the mould for all the others, the Cotswolds Antique Dealers Association this year celebrates its 25th anniversary.

AS usual, hot on the heels of Caroline Penman’s Chelsea Ant-iques Fair at the Old Town Hall in the King’s Road, London SW3, comes The Little Chelsea Antiques Fair on October 6 and 7.

The Establishment remains unconvinced but eccentric’s studio sale is a sell-out: HAVING claimed to have slept with 3000 women, and certainly having fathered at least 15 children and kept open studio for the entire community of local vagrants, one of whom he kept embalmed in a drawer for 15 years, the Plymouth painter Robert Lenkiewicz (1941-2002) was undoubtedly one of the great larger-than-life characters of British post-War art.

THE Society of Fine Art Auctioneers have awarded a number of Honorary Associate memberships to leading industry figures. The awards were announced by SOFAA chairman Chris Ewbank at the society’s dinner, held last week at the Royal Thames Yacht Club in Knightsbridge.

ONE of the oldest provincial vetted fairs, the annual Surrey Antiques Fair, moves for its 37th staging next year to Farnham Castle. It has always been held at Guildford Civic Hall, which is due to close for redevelopment, and while the closure has been on the cards for some years, it was finalised earlier this year. The last Surrey fair in Guildford is held this week from October 2 to 5.

Modern British’s reputation as the market of the moment was underlined at Sotheby’s Olympia (20/12% buyer’s premium) on September 10 when the trade had their last major opportunity to buy stock before the 20/21 British Art Fair.

ARGUABLY the most apt backdrop for an art fair anywhere in the world is the Renaissance city of Florence, and the city can be seen at its best at this time of year when, from September 26 to October 5, the 23rd Florence Biennale takes place at the Palazzo Corsini on the Arno.

IF the buzz and business achieved at last week’s opening night continued throughout, then the 20/21 British Art Fair at the Commonwealth Institute in Kensington should prove one of the fair hits of the year.

ONE of the Home Counties’ longest running vetted, quality events, the Surrey Antiques Fair, will be held for the 36th year from October 2 to 5 and it will be the end of an era as this is the last staging at its original venue, the Guildford Civic Hall.