Europe

When designing his wellknown chairs, the Italian-American designer Harry Bertoia drew on his early experience as a jeweller and sculptor.

Sometimes there is no need for hyperbole: the story behind the auction on March 15 at Neumeister (27% buyer’s premium) in Munich was quite remarkable in itself.

More than 2600 online bidders registered for the sale at Van Ham (25% buyer’s premium) in Cologne on February 24-25.

In today’s world of modern communication, it is inevitable that several Chinese collectors would discover a 16th century Ming Dynasty ritual vessel in the catalogue of a saleroom in a small town on the edge of the Black Forest in the south-west corner of Germany.

This gold-mounted trefoil shaped rock crystal tazza, dated to the 18th century, will feature in the sale of antiques, works of art, silver and jewellery at Veritas in Lisbon on April 14-15.

Woman excluded from the guild of artists was nevertheless highly rated by kings and emperor

This 19th century Carrara marble group by the Florentine sculptor Odoardo Fantacchiotti featured in Genoa on March 16.

A Sèvres cabaret service painted with portraits of famous women was a New Year’s gift from a French empress

A painting by the French 18th century artist Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1732-1806) was discovered last January hanging on the wall in a local home.

An Old Master drawing by the Italian Baroque sculptor, architect and artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680) sold for a hammer price of €1.55m (£1.34m) at an auction in Compiègne in France.

Attributed to northern Italian sculptor Girolamo Campagna (1549-1625), this hitherto unrecorded model of Amphitrite, Poseidon’s wife, features in an exhibition of Renaissance sculpture under way at Galerie Sismann.

Apprenticed to John Flaxman at the turn of the 19th century, Joseph Gott (1785-1860) travelled to Rome in 1822 on a pension from Sir Thomas Lawrence.

Colonel stationed in Africa then China amassed an impressive collection that sold at auction in France earlier this month

With so much talk of fairs cancelled, auctions postponed and dealer activity constrained, it makes a change to feature the opening of a new gallery.

This 9¼in (23.5cm) diameter Sèvres porcelain plate is painted en grisaille with a portrait of the artist Annibale Carracci within borders of chrome green and gilt laurel and oak leaves, fleur de lys, palmettes and florets.

A sale of design and 20th century decorative arts to be staged by Aguttes on March 30 spans items from the Art Nouveau era through to the latter decades of the 20th century.

No fewer than 248 pieces feature in this grand Paris porcelain table service painted with floral reserves on a green and gilt border and central flowersprays.

A bronze figure of Mars from the studio of Giambologna will be one of the highlights in a sale of furniture, paintings, sculpture and works of art to be held at Drouot by L’Huillier on April 2.