Auctions

A major test of the market for the best of British furniture will take place in London this summer when Christie’s stages a sale dedicated to Thomas Chippendale.

Well-provenanced Chinese monochromes dominated bidding at recent Asian art sales across the UK regions.

The emperor Qianlong collected Western clocks throughout his 60-year reign, building upon the interest of his grandfather Kangxi.

London auction house Dix Noonan Webb is launching a stand-alone banknotes department and expanding into the next-door premises.

British artists dominated Sworders’ (23% buyer’s premium) Modern & Contemporary prints sale in Essex, with works by Banksy, Patrick Hughes, Damien Hirst, Bridget Riley and Grayson Perry all getting away.

Marvel comics in considerable numbers were a feature of a May 10 sale held by Golding Young & Mawer (20% buyer’s premium).

Three tribal art previews of objects being offered at auctions in Paris and Vienna.

A trademark bronze sculpture by Lynn Chadwick (1914-2003) was the best-seller at a Modern and Contemporary Art & Design auction held by Chorley’s (20% buyer’s premium) at Prinknash Abbey Park in Gloucestershire.

Last year the UK’s regional salerooms were treated to a generous handful of five- and six-figure bids for unappreciated masterworks of Aboriginal and Oceanian art – a Maori putorino or bugle flute sold to a French dealer for £140,000 at John Nicholson’s of Haslemere among them.

It has been a generally encouraging spring at the UK rostrum. A latest look back at half-a-dozen auctions at major rooms reveals strong demand across the board of interests, and across the centuries to near the present day.

An early work by Yiannis Tsarouchis (1910-89) topped Bonhams’ Greek Sale in New Bond Street on May 2, selling above estimate at £120,000 (plus 25/20/12% buyer’s premium).

Once-fashionable drum tables took a big hit during the furniture slump and while the best can do well, others can be picked up cheaply.

Three modestly valued works in regional sales including an oil painting by Charles Lutyens.

The best of the furniture from the contents of Faringdon House went to a Christie’s (25/20/12.5% buyer’s premium) Interiors sale, but perhaps the more interesting items from the 18th century Oxfordshire manor were handled by Wiltshire saleroom Kidson-Trigg (20% buyer’s premium).

Throughout the furniture depression, late Victorian and Edwardian chairs and sofas produced by the London firm of upholsterers Howard & Sons maintained their prices.

A stellar single-owner offering of works by the Scottish Colourists will be offered in a dedicated sale at Sotheby’s.