International

Hit by a lack of top-end auction consignments, the global art market declined markedly in 2016, according to the latest art market report.

Christine Trémoulet sells ‘batteries de cuisine’. The range of copper pots, pans and tools used in professional kitchens include these late 18th/19th century shining copper moulds she supplies to some of France’s top chefs including Alain Ducasse and Michel Guérard.

Seen here is one of 13 coloured lithographs by Marc Chagall that make up Tales from the Arabian Nights, a special, deluxe portfolio printed by Albert Carman and published by Pantheon Books in New York in 1948.

Claudie Ferré, shown reflected in the table mirror on her brightly-lit stand, sells lighting from the Art Deco period to the 1970s, many by German designers.

Balthasar Van der Ast (c.1593-1657) is considered by many to be one of the most important Dutch still-life painters of the 17th century.

French industrial furniture has a strong presence at this fair.

A day out at France’s largest brocante and the return of classic chic with a contemporary twist...

The diverse collection of Jeffrey M Kaplan is making various appearances under the hammer this spring.

Past playthings by a host of famous vintage toy manufacturers will feature in the next Signature sale of Toys and Trains held by the specialist auction house Bertoia in Vineland, New Jersey, on March 25.

The legal impasse surrounding the restitution of thousands of historical documents and manuscripts from the scandal-hit Aristophil investment scheme was finally broken last week.

Since its launch in 2002 the TEFAF Art Market Report has established itself as the art and antiques trade’s key annual barometer of size and trends.

Typewriters on which famous books came into existence have featured on these pages before, but not for some time – and certainly not machines of a kind that that continue to be used by their owner to this day.

The Pittsfield, Massachusetts, auction house Fontaine’s has a track record of selling good examples of horology and has achieved some very high prices recently for elaborate English clocks made for the Chinese market.

A select sale of just 31 lots of Asian art assembled by a Japanese collector and his sons raised a recordbreaking $262.8m (£215.5m) at Christie’s New York on March 15. It made more in a single evening than any New York Asian sale series.

It is not often that market economists agree, and so it goes with the TEFAF Art Market Report’s current and previous authors. Economics is, after all, not an exact science and analysing a market as opaque as art and antiques is certainly problematic.