Europe

The Japanese Legacy Symposium’s Samurai Armor Fair debuts this month.

Two exceptionally rare celestial globes or spheres have made their mark in Geneva and London salerooms in recent times – and on the same day.

An 800-year-old hurdy-gurdy, thought to be the oldest in Europe, features in a collection of 450 musical instruments from a German private museum coming up at auction.

I was enjoying the annual SLAD Christmas drinks in December, when a dealer started to recount an extraordinary experience he had with a German auction house.

Hermann Historica (23% buyer’s premium) of Munich mounted its customary assault on the arms and armour market with no fewer than seven catalogues covering more than 6000 objects, ranging from ancient Greek helmets to military and other vehicles.

Asian art sales are always unpredictable, more often than not in a positive sense.

Bargueño desks, designed to hold documents and money, originated in Renaissance Spain and remained popular through the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries.

The chap in the voluminous breeches shown below is far removed from today’s riflemen as far as combat uniform is concerned.

Brussels gears up for its major art and antiques fair this month with the latest edition of BRAFA.

Antiquities is one of BRAFA’s strong suits in terms of exhibitor volume. Around 10 specialists in this field are standing, plus a number of others that mix antiquities with, for example, Asian art.

The picture dealer element of BRAFA is substantial, but increasingly these days the emphasis is on works from the 19th century onwards, be they Impressionist and modern or post-war and contemporary art.

BRAFA has long been a fair with a speciality in early (medieval and Renaissance) works of art, which is something that dates back to the years when it was a Belgian National fair in the city centre. It thus serves a venerable collecting tradition drawing in buyers from the local area and further afield.

Tribal art has long been a Belgian speciality due to the country’s colonial history in Africa. So it is not surprising to see this area well represented at BRAFA, with around a dozen participants in this field hailing from Paris, Brussels and as far away as Montreal.

Some of the works on offer at BRAFA are simply too quirky to fit into any time-honoured collecting category, but they are often responsible for creating an eyecatching draw to a particular stand.

While BRAFA understandably dominates much of the cultural headlines during this period, it is not the only show in town.

The Morren Galleries in Utrecht is bringing this striking bronze Springende Haas (Leaping Hare), pictured , to Amsterdam’s First Art Fair. The work of Rotterdam sculptor Evert den Hartog, it is priced at €6750, and measures 19 x 20 x 5in (47 x 52 x 12cm).