UK

THE first of this year’s three Olympia Fine Art and Antiques Fairs is upon us when, from March 2 to 7 some 180 dealers mount a varied and colourful display at the West London exhibition halls. This is the only Olympia with no datelines and it gives the dealers in contemporary and 20th century items all the scope they need for a stylish, eye-catching display.

Cheffins of Cambridge are celebrating what must rank as one of the most dramatic – and certainly one of the highest – prices ever recorded in the UK provinces after their February 11-12 sale that included a pair of white marble seated figures by Sir Henry Cheere (1703-81).

Portsmouth are just hanging on in the Premiership at present, but they too have had their glory days, and in a December 10 sale held by Nesbits of neighbouring Southsea, this programme (right) for the last pre-war FA Cup Final of 1939, in which they beat Wolves 4-1, was sold for £400 (a ticket for that game made £135) and another for the 1934 final, in which they had been beaten 2-1 by Manchester City, was bid to £450.

JUST about six weeks into the new year and on the antiques fair front things are much like last year. Fairs so far have neither really flourished nor foundered. At best they tick over with some dealers doing very well. At worse they end with no exhibitors having enjoyed any real success. We are still waiting for the blockbuster fair.

COMPLETELY full, and with a genuine waiting list, Caroline Penman’s tried and trusted Chester Antiques and Fine Art Show is ready for the off at the County Grandstand at Chester Racecourse from February 12 to 15.

An unprecedented crowd of over 500 people turned up to watch, if not bid, at Sotheby’s near sell-out Part I auction of contemporary art on February 5. A stream of telephone bids created numerous eye-catching results, including new auction highs for Nicolas de Staël (£1.15m), Richard Hamilton (£100,000), R.B. Kitaj (£220,000), Paul Pfeiffer (£40,000) and last year’s Turner Prizewinner Grayson Perry (b.1960).

CIGARETTE CARDS AND POSTCARDS: The cigarette and postcard auction is one of those corners of the collectables market where sales are keenly awaited by a specialist clientele and where very little tends to get left without a buyer.

FAR from the traditional image of the stuffy bookseller, Mayfair-based Biblion, who deal in antiquarian books and first editions out of Davies Mews, W1, are celebrating St. Valentine’s Day with what can best be described as a sonnet-o-gram.

Wrotham Park, Hertfordshire, situated just 14 miles from Central London, has been the home of the Byng family for over 250 years but it is best known to a wider public for the starring role it played as the face of Gosford Park, the stately home in the eponymous Robert Altman film that brilliantly analyses the life of a country house above and below stairs.

AFTER a couple of years in the country, London dealer Alasdair Brown has returned to Chelsea and is preparing to dive back into the London trade melee.

Dead animals are usually regarded as a major commercial no-no in a painting, as is excessive size. It was therefore hardly a surprise that a recently restored and relined 5ft 10in by 8ft (1.78 x 2.44m) Richard Ansdell (1815-1885) canvas featuring a dead wolf and a dying dog did not exactly inspire a blizzard of bids when it came under the hammer at Maxwells of Wilmslow on January 23.

Scottish, Greek and Australian subjects gave a welcome international feel to the main highlights among the pictures offered on the third day of Gorringes’ (15% buyer’s premium) January 27-29 sale in Lewes.

ESSEX organiser Robert Bailey is relishing his new role as ringmaster of LAPADA’s London showcase, The LAPADA Fine Art & Antiques Fair at Claridge’s, which will be held at the exclusive Mayfair hotel from April 14 to 18.

Although it might have been small beer by the standards of the New York Old Master sales reported last week, the presence of a £13,000 Italian still-life painting gave a welcome financial boost to Brightwells’ (15% buyer’s premium) inaugural auction at their new purpose-built Easters Court saleroom on the eastern outskirts of Leominster on January 15.

ISLAMIC ART: A MAJOR donation hase been given to the Victoria and Albert Museum, to enable it to completely refurbish its Islamic Gallery, home to the famous Ardabil carpet and many other treasures from the Middle East.

FROM April London will have a new specialist book auctioneer. Biblion is already a major name in the antiquarian book world through the group shop at Grays Antique Market W1, where the stock of over 100 dealers is on offer and their website, Biblion.com, which carries the inventory of 500 booksellers.

BONHAMS have appointed Pippa Stockdale as managing director of the company’s Knightsbridge saleroom. Formerly the head of the pictures department at Knightsbridge, Ms. Stockdale joined Bonhams as a cataloguer in 1989 following time at Capes Dunn in Manchester.

Contemporary art shines in London: The February round of Impressionist, Modern and Contemporary sales in London gave plenty of evidence that the top end of the art market has made a strong recovery from last year’s bout of Iraq War syndrome.

Christie’s South Kensington increase their buyer’s premium from February 11: The new rate will be 19.5 per cent of the final bid price of each lot up to £70,000 and 12 per cent on the excess of the hammer price above £70,000, the same premium currently charged at Christie’s King Street.

THE country’s premier dedicated trade jewellery show International Jewellery London has appointed Alison Marshall as their new organising manager.