UK

BACK in London, Chris Beetles of Ryder Street in St James’s has just opened his amusing annual show of cat pictures, which, as always, features an important group of works by the world’s most famous exponent of the genre, Louis Wain (1860-1939).

THE Fergusson show at Alexander Meddowes, coincides with Edinburgh’s exhilarating annual Festival, which brings with it not only hundreds of incredibly diverse theatrical shows but a good sprinkling of art exhibitions too.

PICTURED here are two outstanding pieces of provincial silver sold in the country during August.

BUSINESS proved agonisingly slow for many of the exhibitors at Antiques For Everyone - Earls Court Two, held in West London from August 19 to 22. Apparently, there were sales on the opening day but by the third afternoon there was much talk in the hall that this event would not be held next year.

Originality and patina are key factors in the price of oak furniture. Accordingly, it was no surprise to see the trade chase this austere George III elm cricket table at Richard Winterton (12.5% buyer’s premium) of Burton-on-Trent on July 28. Entered by a Birmingham client, the table, with its galleried undertier was in fine original condition with no later adaptations and the timber had acquired a good rich patina. It doubled the pre-sale estimate to bring £950.

THESE two superb pieces of Victorian silver proved flagship lots for two south of England salerooms in July.

UNDER the name Art Nouveau Originals, specialist dealer Cathy Turner is a very well-known figure on the fairs circuit, but she will now be even better known since she has just purchased The Bindery Gallery at 69 High Street, Broadway, Worcestershire (Tel: 01386 854645).

DESPITE having success in his day, it seems a major oversight that marine artist Neville Sotheby Pitcher (1889-1959) does not make it into the specialist reference books such as E.H.H. Archibald’s The Dictionary of Sea Painters.

TIMES may be tough at fairs, but that does not stop organisers launching new ones, nor dealers giving them a go.

HIGH-profile dealers Reindeer Antiques, who have a shop in Kensington Church Street, London W8 and a large complex in Northamptonshire, are to convert part of the latter into the Reindeer Antiques Centre.

SHAME on veteran organiser Cindy Mainwaring for mentioning the ‘C’ word when the summer is barely out.

ONE of the pioneers of the vogue for Japanese and Chinese design in the 1870s, Joseph Theodore Deck was also one of the first 19th century potters to explore Isnik floral designs and colour schemes. It was during his efforts to replicate the Turkish palette that he perfected the turquoise glaze that came to be known as bleu de Deck, or Deck blue.

A LOCAL estate provided the Thames Valley firm Bourne End Auction Rooms (12% buyer’s premium) with some fine lots for sale on August 4.

HOW many dealers, I wonder, dread, rather than dream of, their business area being “discovered”? Long before Covent Garden became a trendy mecca for international tourists, one of the familiar attractions for habitués was London dealer Arthur Middleton’s distinctive shop in New Row, full of early globes and all sorts of antique scientific instruments.

AFTER four years of organising fairs at the Bournemouth Pavilion, the Hampshire-based organisers Valerie and Ken Sleeney, believe the wealthy town and hinterland has more to offer.

AUCTIONEERS and dealers in the south east are being warned by police to be alert to a man who has bounced cheques in a succession of salerooms in East Anglia.

CONGRATULATIONS to Middlesex-based organiser Sue Cruttenden who this month celebrates 25 years of her fortnightly Sunbury Antiques Market at Kempton Park Race Course, Sunbury-on-Thames.

LAPADA have abandoned Claridge’s as the venue for their London fair but plans for the launch of their LAPADA Autumn Antiques & Fine Art Fair are well advanced and well received by members of our largest trade association.

MEANWHILE, that well-known and popular organiser Reg Cooper, who knows as much about the vicissitudes of the business as most, is returning confidently to the fray with a new venture.

HOME Counties organisers Jill Napper and Joy O’Meara, who operate as Jay Fairs, have just acquired the long-established Benson Antiques & Collectors Fair, held in the Parish Hall at Benson, Oxfordshire. They will run the fair from September 19 and on the third Sunday of each month thereafter. It will be AA signposted.