Auctions

Seen here are two lots from the Ronald A. Cohen collection of Books, Prints and Objects illustrative of the History of Dentistry and Teeth, a 674-lot sale held by Bonhams on December 10.

CHESHIRE auctioneers Peter Wilson, (15% buyer’s premium) found it hard going at their November 27-28 sale at Nantwich with only 60 per cent of the 720 lots getting away – but where obvious quality was on offer, bidders were keen enough.

Another instalment from the holdings of well-known collector Stanley J. Seeger went under the hammer at Sotheby’s Olympia rooms on December 13. This 352-lot offering, subtitled Out Takes, was a particularly eclectic selection, ranging from contemporary Venetian glass and tribal art to Middle Eastern pottery and Victorian chaises longues.

The Gart der Gesundheit is one of the giants in the field. The most important herbal of the 15th century, it contained the finest illustrations of the incunable period and was unsurpassed until the appearance of the first edition of the Brunfels herbal in 1530.

19th century cameo glass was the strong suit in Sotheby’s sale of European glass from the Hida Takayama Museum of Art in Japan, held in their Bond Street rooms on December 19. Amongst a number of pieces that were particularly keenly contested by the room and the telephones was this 16in (41cm) high Thomas Webb vase which sold to a private buyer for £95,000 (plus 19.5/10% premium) after bidding first from the room then a battle between two telephones.

Ceramics: November/December saw a whole slew of ceramics sales take place in the London rooms either devoted entirely to British or to Continental material or a mix of the two. One of the last to take place was Bonhams’ indigenous selection offered in their Bond Street rooms on December 11.

Patrick Bogue has been holding successful poster sales at specialist collectables auctioneers Onslows since 1984 and his latest was a reminder that Christie’s South Kensington do not have a monopoly on this active market.

Tajan, who have made cartoons and comic strips into a saleroom speciality, claimed a saleroom first on November 30: a pioneering opportunity for fans of Lucky Luke, the self-styled “poor lonesome cowboy”, to buy an original plate by his artist Morris.

Sotheby’s claimed a world record price for a printed French book on December 5 when a 1931 edition of Balzac’s Le Chef d’Oeuvre Inconnu, illustrated by Picasso, sold just short of estimate for €550,000 (£353,000).

Continental Furniture: Christie’s offered a concentration of furnishings from Continental Europe on December 12, kicking off with a select 114-lot, separately catalogued morning session devoted entirely to French furniture, with a larger 240-odd lots drawn from across the European spectrum in the afternoon.

European Works of Art: There was no real surprise about the star lot in Sotheby’s December 10 works of art sale. The piece that attracted plenty of attention at the pre-sale viewing and made far and away the highest price in the 177-lot gathering was this c.1520-25 terracotta bust of the Virgin and Child by Il Riccio, which, at £3m, singlehandedly accounted for two thirds of the auction’s entire £4.47m total.

Unsigned Arts & Crafts metalwork has lately been getting the sort of high prices normally reserved for attributable material and this copper-mounted mirror, right, was no exception – the sleeper of Bonhams’ (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) sale of Decorative Arts at Glasgow School of Arts on November 28.

Coming up in Galashiels... The Yorkshire Arts and Crafts cabinetmaker Robert ‘Mouseman’ Thompson hardly needs an introduction. His distinctive adzed oak furniture, each piece relief-carved with a small mouse, proved so successful that a menagerie of imitators sprang up in the 1950s and ’60s.

Understandably, the Russians left this one behind when they liberated the Reichstag in 1945, but a Tommy NCO with a sense of humour decided to rescue this beleaguered portrait of the First World War German Field Marshall and Weimar president Paul von Hindenburg, right, from the ruins and take him back to the West Country.

Just where were those bears made? The familiar stands, seats and other furnishings fashioned as realistically carved bears, usually from limewood, have traditionally been attributed to the Black Forest region of West Germany but recent researches suggest that Switzerland is a more likely source.

A combination of vendors reluctant to consign the best quality goods and cautious bidding from the trade created a fairly low-key atmosphere at London’s traditional pre-Christmas round of Old Master picture sales.

WHILE the Irish picture market continues to boom, the Scottish market showed serious jitters at Bonhams Edinburgh (17.5% buyer’s premium) on the evening of December 5.

HOW can coins being sold on the rostrum in New York be sitting safely locked up in London and elsewhere at the same time? That is the conundrum facing the coins and medals world following the publication of a catalogue and results from a sale organised in New York by Riccardo Paolucci, a Yorkshire-based Italian dealer.

Coming up on December 11, 12 and 13 is Rupert Toovey & Co’s Sale of Antiques, Fine Art & Collectors’ Items, which will be the inaugural sale at their new Spring Gardens salerooms in Washington, West Sussex.

ONE of the most bizarre and unexpected results at Tennants’ sale in North Yorkshire on 21-22 December involved a collection of more than 200 19th century marbles, a selection of which are shown right.