Louis Wain ceramic cats and other animals coming up for sale at Kinghams next month.
Get your claws into Wain ceramic cats
One of the largest single-owner collections of Louis Wain (1860-1939) ceramic cats to come on the market in recent years is up for auction on October 6.
The private collection on offer at Kinghams of Moretonin-Marsh was amassed over many years by a Cotswoldbased collector, comprising an extensive array of cats and tea wares.
It centres on Wain’s works in avant-garde ceramic form. These include eight Britishmade ‘futuristic’ or ‘cubist’ cats which were created between 1910-12.
These first appeared at an exhibition in 1914 where Wain designed a set of nine cats, a pig, and a dog. They were given Lucky names such as The Lucky Futurist Cat and Lucky Haw Haw Cat. One of the rarest is The Lucky Sphinx cat, an example of which appears in the collection. All the cats were produced in very small quantities and one batch bound for the US was hit by a torpedo and sunk.
Alongside the cubist spill vases, there is a set of four Wain Laughing Cats created for Wilkinson Pottery, each with a different coloured bowtie, and a large selection of rare transfer printed wares for Paragon China, including baby plates and tea wares.
Estimates will range from £80 to over £500.
Lisbon Lion Auld’s shirts up for sale
Celtic player Bertie Auld’s memorabilia will be offered at Glasgow auction house McTear’s.
Glasgow-born Bertie Auld (1938-2021) was a football midfield maestro. He played in two spells for Celtic, making 275 appearances and scoring 79 goals, and his second period at Parkhead from 1965 included five league titles, four League Cups, three Scottish Cups and the 1967 European Cup.
The Bertie Auld Collection, which is being sold by his family through Glasgow auction house McTear’s on October 12, includes jerseys he swapped with some of Europe’s top players during the momentous runs to the European Cup finals in 1967 and 1970.
Among the 17 shirts and other Celtic and Scotland memorabilia is that of Inter Milan captain Armando Picchi, who swapped with Auld after the Italian club’s 2-1 defeat in the European Cup final in Lisbon in May 1967. Pictured above (blue and black stripes), it is estimated at £20,000-30,000.
Auld’s robust playing style earned him Scotland’s first ever red card during a match with the Netherlands on May 27, 1959 – one of the shirts on offer here.
Noonans launches Canadian branch
Tanya Ursual of Noonans in Canada.
Following its inaugural sale in Singapore in March, auction house Noonans has expanded its global network with the opening of a new branch in Canada. Based to the south of Ottawa, the branch will handle consignments from all over North America under the management of Tanya Ursual, a numismatist and medal specialist with 30 years’ experience. She created medalsofwar.com, one of the first military source websites.
The Singapore branch opened in 2022 to coincide with the announcement of a series of auctions to be held by Noonans. It is managed by Terence Noe.
Of mice and man: an Oakley archive
One of Graham Oakley’s Sampson and The Church Mice illustrations up for auction at Charterhouse.
Dorset firm Charterhouse has been instructed to auction the Graham Oakley archive of original watercolour drawings.
The lots include hundreds of drawings from the hugely successful Church Mice books he wrote and illustrated from 1970-2000 and feature cover illustrations along with other books he produced such as the Foxbury Force.
Also offered is a lot of Oakley’s personal paint box, brushes and other artist supplies. Overall, the collection is estimated towards £100,000. “Graham sadly passed away in Dorchester last year,” said auctioneer Richard Bromell. “He is perhaps most famous for his positively charming Church Mice book series and in his will he generously left his studio archive to benefit Save the Children.”
Over 750 Graham Oakley lots of original artwork will be offered without reserve in Sherborne on September 27.
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In Numbers
15
The number of years PAD London has now been running. The 2023 edition takes place in Berkeley Square, Mayfair, from October 10-15. This 15th anniversary staging includes 62 galleries.
