Front Page and News

A rediscovered neoclassical painting by Charles Meynier somersaulted nine times over its estimate to sell for €1.8m (£1.57m) at a sale in Nantes.

When the first wave of Kenner Star Wars action figures began arriving on the market in 1978, the Darth Vader, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker figures came with ‘double telescoping’ light sabres.

The BBC has put the production of antiques game show Bargain Hunt out to tender for a two-year contract, despite speculation that the long-running programme, now in its 50th series, would be axed in a drive to boost the quality of daytime TV output.

An exceptionally rare Western Zhou bronze, taken when the Summer Palace was sacked by British troops in 1860, has been discovered in a house in a Kent seaside town.

The UK's National Portrait Gallery (NPG) has funding in place for vernacular portraits ‘owned by ordinary people’. It is calling on the trade to help it acquire works for a new exhibition centred on identity before the era of painted portraiture.

Lyon & Turnbull has appointed Philip Smith, former head of modern & post-war art and design at Mallams, to the newly created role of associate director for modern art and design.

A private museum in south-west Germany has bought a portrait by Swiss artist Jean- Etienne Liotard (1702-89) from London Old Master dealer Derek Johns.

More than $120m of Asian art was sold at auction during last week’s New York Asia Week.

The art and antiques trade is facing further money laundering regulation from the European Union.

An American private collector bid £15,000 for a rare Clarice Cliff figure group at Woolley & Wallis in Salisbury.

A cluster of new fairs is planned in Europe this year.

Online channels are an increasing source of new buyers for both auction houses and dealers, despite the art and antiques sector being behind the wider economy when it comes to use of ecommerce, a new global report says.

Two businessmen from Auckland have rescued New Zealand auction house Webb’s from administration after the collapse of parent company Mossgreen.

Among the first sales of BADA 2018 was this modernist Archibald Knox silver and pink enamel inkwell sold from the stand of The Peartree Collection for more than £10,000.

An investigation in Germany into an Israeli art dealer, charged with being the ringleader of an international fraud ring, has concluded after the two central allegations against him were dropped.

An unexpected highlight of a recent sale at Sworders in Stansted Mountfitchet was this set of four early real tennis rackets. They came from a client in the North of England and had been owned by the family for many years.

Unbolted continues its move into the art and antiques sector with Holts the latest firm to offer its lending services to customers.

Leaders of four African countries have called on the UK and the EU to ban the trade in antique ivory to help stop elephant poaching.

William George, an online-only auctioneer which ceased trading antique ivory in 2017, is setting up a group called Auctioneers Against Ivory for auctioneers considering their own antique ivory strategies.

Art market experts are calling for the trade to tackle the widely reported claim that the sector is unregulated, made by a defendant in a $50m international money-laundering case.