London

Hosted by ATG at the City Flogger in the City of London, the event brought together 20 teams from all areas of the art and antiques world for a light-hearted charity event which nevertheless caused some serious head-scratching.

Breaking its own record as the most expensive piece of furniture ever sold at auction, this massive, 12ft 8in (3.86m) high, 18th century Florentine ebony, ormolu and pietra dura architectural display piece known as The Badminton Cabinet brought Christie’s December 9 sale of European furniture to a dramatic climax last week when it sold for £17m (£19,045,250 including premium).

FEIGEN Aaron is a new firm in London’s St James’s launched by two top dealers from New York and Paris and aimed at the expanding Russian market.

A NEW auction house has opened in London’s West End focusing on Russian art, one of the fastest growing sectors of the world art market.

WHEN it comes to Beatrix Potter, they don’t come rarer than this previously unrecorded first trade edition of The Tale of Peter Rabbit.

THE international Asian art community descended on London from November 4-12 to battle for the best quality Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Southeast Asian material the major houses and dealers could muster during Asian Art in London.

POLICE investigating the theft of Tang and Yuan dynasty jewellery and body ornaments from the British Museum on October 29-30 believe the raid could be linked to the theft of Chinese jades from the Victoria and Albert Museum earlier last month.

NEXT spring Caroline Penman launches a new fair at Chelsea Old Town Hall in King’s Road, London SW3. It will be called The King’s Road Antiques Fair and will run from March 11 to 13.

THE Chicago Clearing Company, the US firm trading in auction house class action certificates, will be in London again this week.

CLARION Events, organisers of the Olympia Fine Art and Antiques Fairs, have successfully completed a £45m management buy-out from their parent company, the Earls Court & Olympia Group (EC&O). They emphasise their continued commitment to the antiques fairs.

THE current fashionable status of antiquities and the charm of animal subject matter proved an irresistible combination for collectors last week when Christie’s offered the late Leo Mildenberg’s collection of ancient animals. The two-day dispersal of the German-born collector’s Noah’s ark, in London on October 26 and 27, totalled just over £3m.

BACK in April in Antiques Trade Gazette No 1633, we pictured and discussed an unusual Derby porter mug decorated with industrial scenes of two Mancunian foundries which sold at Bonhams in London for £3800.

THE V&A have opened the first new gallery in their £30m transformation programme.

BUYING and selling art and antiques is one thing, but what about transporting it from the place of sale to its destination?

THE winners of the Asian Art in London Outstanding Work of Art Awards, sponsored by the Antiques Trade Gazette, were announced last week.

THERE are few more commercial subjects than children. Accordingly, it was no surprise that this near life-size Italian marble group of two children playing on a balcony (pictured right) by Donato Barcaglia, dating from the late 19th century stole the limelight at Christie’s King Street (19.5/12% buyer’s premium) 19th century furniture, sculpture, works of art and ceramics sale on September 30.

TWO or three times a year Bonhams (19.5/10% buyer's premium) offer a selection of modern pieces in their monthly Knightsbridge silver and objects of vertu sales. Undoubtedly a growth area of the market, works by major names such as Stuart Devlin, Gerald Benney and Christopher Lawrence routinely feature amongst the top ten lots.

CADOGAN Tate, the international packing, shipping and storage company, have announced that they have turned The Packing Shop into a profitable concern. They acquired the assets and goodwill of the antiques specialists just over a year ago.

NEXT year’s Watercolour and Drawings Fair will move to a new venue, the Royal Academy rooms at 6 Burlington Gardens, London W1, where it will run from February 3 to 6 with an opening evening preview on February 2.

FRENCH dealer in Chinese antique stands, Laurence Paul, is currently showing at an antiques fair in Beijing, but she will be back in time for the first monthly Sunday fair of her winter season on October 17 at the Thistle Kensington Palace Hotel, London W8.