International

Christie’s, the first international auction house to be granted a licence to operate independently in mainland China, have announced the date of their first auction.

Demonstrating the benefits that provincial auctioneers continue to derive from the growth in demand for Modern British art, a number of this summer’s sale highlights in the regions were supplied by 20th century pictures.

Heritage Auctions of Dallas, Texas, are claiming a new auction record for an insert movie poster.

Several of the main French auction firms and French branches of international houses have produced their half-year sales figures.

For the second time in a decade, on August 10, Heritage in Dallas will offer for sale the prototype of the original GI Joe figure.

An exceptional piece of 17th century Japanese export lacquer with a provenance to match has produced the highest auction price in France this year when it was sold to the Rijksmuseum for a hammer price of €5.9m (£5.26m).

David Gonzalez, a builder and decorator in Hoffman, Minnesota, bought a small house on his own account for $10,100 and set to work on fixing it up for re-sale. Then he took down one of the walls and revealed a hidden treasure.

UK dealers and auction houses have been alerted to the theft of six oil paintings by Evie Hone from a church in Ireland.

A new decree under French law has banned the mailing of banknotes, coins, jewellery and precious metals using the standard French postal system.

The price of gold has continued to drop, falling to its lowest level in almost three years, after the US Federal Reserve said it will be winding down its quantitative easing programme.

Fred Williams’ ‘You Yangs Landscape 1’ of 1963 made the highest price of the 89-lot sale of Australian art from the Reg Grundy and Joy Chambers-Grundy collection when it sold for Aus$1.9m (£1.2m).

A sickle-leaf carpet from the William A. Clark collection has set a new auction record for a Persian carpet after selling for $30m (£20.5m) at Sotheby’s New York.

Two of Manhattan’s largest and best-known antiques shows are now under new management following the acquisition of the ‘Pier Antiques Show’ and the ‘Antiques at the Armory Show’ by GLM from Stella Show Management.

Stuttgart auctioneers Nagel achieved a new German auction record for Oriental art when they sold a Yongzheng mark and period wine pot and cover for €2.8m (£2.37m).

If you want to complete a collection of Olympic participation medals, then one in particular – that made for the 1904 Games in St Louis – is going to cost you a lot of money.

Dealers in New York can no longer use works consigned to them for sale by artists – or monies raised from their sale, beyond their own commissions – as debt collateral.

Christie’s evening sale of Contemporary art in New York last night posted a hammer total of $435.5m (£294.2m).

A painting by Chaim Soutine (1893-1943) entitled ‘Le petit pâtissier’ was the top lot of Christie’s latest evening sale of Impressionist & Modern art in New York.

Paul Cézanne’s ‘Les pommes’ led the way at Sotheby’s latest evening sale of Impressionist & Modern Art in New York.

It has a face value of ten shillings but a price tag of Aus$3.5m (£2.3m) at Coinworks, the specialist dealers and auctioneers of Melbourne.