The London Art Fair opened this week, with sizeable crowds flocking to the opening night, despite freezing temperatures. Photo ACN.

London Eye: January 2010

The London Art Fair opened this week, with sizeable crowds flocking to the opening night, despite freezing temperatures. Photo ACN.

The London Art Fair opened this week, with sizeable crowds flocking to the opening night, despite freezing temperatures. Photo ACN.

London may still be in the grip of the harshest winter since 1963, but this week brought further signs that the art market may be finally emerging from the chill of recession. That said, it is conceivable, given the icy temperatures outside, that the crowds flocking into the Business Design Centre in Islington for the private view of the London Art Fair were attracted more by the promise of complimentary Jack Daniels cocktails than by the art on display. But alongside the red noses were quite a few red dots, so perhaps lethal bourbon cocktails did the trick in persuading punters to purchase pictures.
The recession seemed a thing of the past judging by the number of visitors at the opening night of the London Art Fair. Photo ACN.

The recession seemed a thing of the past judging by the number of visitors at the opening night of the London Art Fair. Photo ACN.

Gallerists were optimistic for the week ahead. “We didn’t have a recession; we had our best year ever in 2009,” said Sarah Goldbart of Millennium Gallery, a Cornwall-based contemporary art dealership. “This is always a really good fair for us where we do a lot of business.”

Millennium is typical of the sort of art business that has surfed ahead despite the troubled economic undercurrents, largely thanks to a roster of active corporate clients and super-rich collectors such as Princess Firyal of Jordan. One of Millennium’s most sought-after artists is Cornish sculptor Simon Allen whose meticulously crafted wall-mounted and free-standing sculptures covered in gold and silver leaf are finding homes in a variety of up-scale locations.

Work by sought-after contemporary sculptor Simon Allen was on the stand of Millennium Gallery at the London Art Fair this week. Photo ACN.

Work by sought-after contemporary sculptor Simon Allen was on the stand of Millennium Gallery at the London Art Fair this week. Photo ACN.

Goldbart said, “We sold several of Simon Allen’s pieces to the Connaught Hotel in London, which is being refurbished, while other works by Simon have sold to Lloyd Dorfman, founding chairman of Travelex, and to Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich who has ordered two of Simon’s sculptures for his new super-yacht, the Eclipse, currently under construction.”

Another gallery that has weathered the economic maelstrom is Eyestorm, the online retailer of limited edition prints. Eyestorm is owned by and, curiously enough, based in the offices of, the London Mayfair-based private equity and hedge fund group Duet Partners. That robust source of funding helped Eyestorm to a successful debut outing at the Scope Fair in Miami this year, according to Angie Davey, who looks after Eyestorm’s Artist Liaison department. There was plenty of activity on their stand at the London Art Fair, where British celebrity artist and TV comedian Vic Reeves was showing his recent paintings, and Eyestorm-published limited edition prints to his showbiz friends.

Away from the glitzy glamour of contemporary art, the rather sedate museum world has supplied some of the more noteworthy news items this month. Last week, the Victoria and Albert Museum opened its new Medieval and Renaissance galleries to universal acclaim. It seems only a short while ago that the museum’s superb collection of Renaissance treasures were crammed into a singularly unprepossessing corridor adjacent to the cafeteria at the rear of the building. Now, however, those dark ages are behind us and this world-class collection has taken up residence in a beautifully refurbished new wing.

In contrast to the fashionable tendency to focus on thematic display, the new galleries have placed the emphasis on history, providing a clear chronology from what used to be called the Dark Ages – but which emerge here as surprisingly sophisticated and enlightened – to the Renaissance. Those familiar with the collection will be thrilled to see their old favorites subtly lit and enjoying acres of space.

talian sculpture Giovanni Pisano depicted the prophet Haggai in Carrara marble circa 1285-1297. It is on view in the Victoria and Albert Museum’s new Mediaeval and Renaissance galleries. Image courtesy V&A Images.

talian sculpture Giovanni Pisano depicted the prophet Haggai in Carrara marble circa 1285-1297. It is on view in the Victoria and Albert Museum’s new Mediaeval and Renaissance galleries. Image courtesy V&A Images.


This tiny ivory figure of the crucified Christ from the Victoria and Albert Museum's collection, will be on display at the museum's new Mediaeval and Renaissance galleries. Image courtesy V&A Images.

This tiny ivory figure of the crucified Christ from the Victoria and Albert Museum’s collection, will be on display at the museum’s new Mediaeval and Renaissance galleries. Image courtesy V&A Images.


This 16th-century enameled and gold pendant in the form of a salamander is on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum's refurbished Mediaeval and Renaissance galleries. Image courtesy V&A Images.

This 16th-century enameled and gold pendant in the form of a salamander is on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum’s refurbished Mediaeval and Renaissance galleries. Image courtesy V&A Images.

The galleries also contain plenty of computer terminals giving access to the collection in digital form. The new galleries represent another significant step in reaffirming the V&A’s status as one of the greatest museums in the world. The museum may have missed out on its daring Liebeskind extension that never happened, but instead it has forged ahead with new glass galleries, refurbished ceramics galleries, a marvelous sculpture display and now the impressive new Medieval and Renaissance galleries. Taken together these add up to a major achievement for director Mark Jones.

It is not only in London that the V&A is reasserting itself. It was announced this week that the Scottish city of Dundee is to get its own Victoria & Albert Museum. The “V&A at Dundee,” as it is being described – a £47 million research center and exhibition venue – is scheduled to open in 2014 on a site south of Craig Harbour in Dundee’s redeveloped waterfront. An international architecture competition will be launched for the new building, which will enable the London V&A to share its collections and will also be home to specialist collections of Scottish contemporary design. The project is expected to bring 500,000 extra visitors to Dundee, while creating up to 900 local jobs.

Antiques fair organizers up and down the country will be praying for an end to the snow and freezing temperatures that have dogged the UK in recent weeks. Travel has been particularly difficult with transport authorities recommending people make only “essential journeys.” Visits to antiques fairs surely qualify as such. One group who will be keeping their fingers crossed for an upturn in temperatures are the 25 exhibitors hoping to show at the Tortworth Court Antiques and Fine Art Fair at the Tortworth Court Four Pillars Hotel in Wotton-Under-Edge in the Cotswolds on the weekend of Feb. 26-28.

Two George III mahogany armchairs in the French Hepplewhite style, circa 1780, are priced £8,750 ($14,200) by Guy Dennler Antiques & Interiors at the Tortworth Court Antiques and Fine Art Fair in the Cotswolds on Feb. 26-28. Photo Antiques Dealers Fair Ltd.

Two George III mahogany armchairs in the French Hepplewhite style, circa 1780, are priced £8,750 ($14,200) by Guy Dennler Antiques & Interiors at the Tortworth Court Antiques and Fine Art Fair in the Cotswolds on Feb. 26-28. Photo Antiques Dealers Fair Ltd.


‘Clothilde de Surville,’ a sculpture by Jean Gautherin, circa 1875, priced at £27,975 ($45,500), from Garret & Hurst Sculpture at the Tortworth Court Antiques and Fine Art Fair in South Gloucestershire on Feb. 26-28. Photo Antiques Dealers Fair Ltd.

‘Clothilde de Surville,’ a sculpture by Jean Gautherin, circa 1875, priced at £27,975 ($45,500), from Garret & Hurst Sculpture at the Tortworth Court Antiques and Fine Art Fair in South Gloucestershire on Feb. 26-28. Photo Antiques Dealers Fair Ltd.


Catherine Hunt Antiques will be offering this rare Kangxi blue and white lidded jar with European and Buddhist designs, circa 1700, at £1,950 ($3,200) at the Tortworth Court Antiques and Fine Art Fair on Feb. 26-28. Photo Antiques Dealers Fair Ltd.

Catherine Hunt Antiques will be offering this rare Kangxi blue and white lidded jar with European and Buddhist designs, circa 1700, at £1,950 ($3,200) at the Tortworth Court Antiques and Fine Art Fair on Feb. 26-28. Photo Antiques Dealers Fair Ltd.

It has become fashionable to hold antique fairs in spa hotels in the hope of encouraging dealers to combine business with pleasure. The Tortworth Court Four Pillars Hotel, which has its own leisure center and gym, is set in 30 acres of private parkland. If that’s not enough to coax collectors out of their winter lethargy, perhaps they’ll be attracted by the rarities on offer at the fair.

At the Chester Antiques Fair on Feb. 11-14, Alan Dawson of Odyssey will be showing this ancient Greek spherical pottery 'aryballos,' or olive oil container, priced at £250 ($405). Image Alan Dawson.

At the Chester Antiques Fair on Feb. 11-14, Alan Dawson of Odyssey will be showing this ancient Greek spherical pottery ‘aryballos,’ or olive oil container, priced at £250 ($405). Image Alan Dawson.


This large and impressive Roman military tile fragment bearing the stamp of the famous 20th Legion, which was stationed at Chester for nearly 200 years late in the first century, is for sale at £550 ($895) at Alan Dawson of Odyssey at the Chester Fair. Image courtesy Odyssey.

This large and impressive Roman military tile fragment bearing the stamp of the famous 20th Legion, which was stationed at Chester for nearly 200 years late in the first century, is for sale at £550 ($895) at Alan Dawson of Odyssey at the Chester Fair. Image courtesy Odyssey.

The same holds true for the Chester Antiques Fair to be held Feb. 11-14 at the County Grandstand at Chester Racecourse. Although eschewing the carnal luxuries of a spa hotel, the Chester event is nevertheless regarded as the premier event for collectors in the northwest and hosts more than 50 dealers from across the country, offering objects at all price levels from £50 to more than £20,000.

This year, the Chester event will feature a number of interesting ancient artifacts including a sixth century B.C. “aryballos,” or olive oil container, of the kind used in public baths in the ancient world. We are told this simple spherical pottery bottle was used for dripping oil onto the skin, which is then scraped off with a metal scraper. Slung from a string round the left wrist, it was the accepted way of cleaning the body in ancient Greece. This attractive and wholly intact antique version of soap-on-a-rope will be offered for sale by Alan Dawson of Odyssey at a perfectly accessible £250 ($405).

Alan Dawson will be showing this Greek terracotta 'erote' figurine at the Chester Fair. It is priced at £625 ($1,020). Image courtesy Odyssey.

Alan Dawson will be showing this Greek terracotta ‘erote’ figurine at the Chester Fair. It is priced at £625 ($1,020). Image courtesy Odyssey.

And so to a couple of interesting items from the UK auction circuit. One might have assumed that the snowdrifts would impact on saleroom business down at West Country auctioneers Woolley & Wallis this month, but apparently not. These days, a bank of phones and some up-to-date Internet bidding technology is all that’s required to keep the bids coming in thick and fast.

Certainly this seems to have been the case in Salisbury with a fascinating and elaborate 18th-century wood and cut-paper maritime diorama, which was offered at Woolley & Wallis’s sale of works of art on Jan. 12. Featuring a fully rigged galleon complete with figures – including a hapless tar drowning in the briny – the appeal of this unusual item was further enhanced by the fact that it was inscribed: “A. Walker Invt. et Fecit, 1763.” The hammer duly fell at £7,500 ($12,200).

This 18th-century wood and cut-paper diorama fetched £7,500 ($12,200) at Woolley & Wallis's January sale of furniture and works of art in Salisbury. Image Woolley & Wallis.

This 18th-century wood and cut-paper diorama fetched £7,500 ($12,200) at Woolley & Wallis’s January sale of furniture and works of art in Salisbury. Image Woolley & Wallis.

Finally, Woolley & Wallis are also poised to offer a very fine quality and prestigiously provenanced piece of English silver in the coming weeks.

William Beckford is arguably the most illustrious collector of the 19th century, turning his home at Fonthill Abbey in Wiltshire into a kind of Gothick Wunderkammer, a camp citadel crammed with all manner of precious objects.

Among the treasures he accumulated over many years of insatiable and eclectic collecting was a pair of silver-gilt waiters decorated with strapwork and a range of heraldic motifs incorporating the famed Beckford arms. Closely resembling a large sideboard dish in the Victoria and Albert Museum’s collection, and by the same maker, the silversmith William Burwash, the waiters are estimated to make £15,000-£20,000 ($24,400-$32,500) on Jan. 27, reflecting their provenance to Beckford and Fonthill.

Formerly in the collection of the illustrious 19th-century collector William Beckford, this silver-gilt waiter is one of a pair expected to bring £15,000-20,000 ($24,400-$32,500) at Woolley & Wallis's Salisbury rooms on Jan. 27. Image Woolley & Wallis.

Formerly in the collection of the illustrious 19th-century collector William Beckford, this silver-gilt waiter is one of a pair expected to bring £15,000-20,000 ($24,400-$32,500) at Woolley & Wallis’s Salisbury rooms on Jan. 27. Image Woolley & Wallis.

This rare 18th-century Chinese famille rose 'abstinence plaque,' a kind of Chinese chastity belt worn by ladies of the court, fetched £6,500 ($10,500) at Woolley & Wallis in Salisbury in November.

London Eye: December 2009

This rare 18th-century Chinese famille rose 'abstinence plaque,' a kind of Chinese chastity belt worn by ladies of the court, fetched £6,500 ($10,500) at Woolley & Wallis in Salisbury in November.

This rare 18th-century Chinese famille rose ‘abstinence plaque,’ a kind of Chinese chastity belt worn by ladies of the court, fetched £6,500 ($10,500) at Woolley & Wallis in Salisbury in November.

While the recession has had a negative impact on the top of the art market, with the bigger fine art auction houses suffering significantly reduced consignments to their blue-chip sales, elsewhere it seems to have had a positive effect. British provincial auction houses have been busy emphasizing their green credentials, promoting local auction sales as recycling opportunities that offer an attractive alternative to buying new.

Another strategy adopted by provincial firms has been to prioritize specialist sales over general dispersals. Salisbury auctioneers Woolley & Wallis are among a small number of UK provincial auction houses who have formed a series of specialist departments with sound expertise in each. As a result they operate more like local versions of Sotheby’s or Christie’s than general auctioneers. This may be the reason why their Asian art offerings, for example, continue to turn up fine and rare objects such as the Yuan dynasty double-gourd vase that made a record hammer price of £2.6 million ($4.6m) at their July 2005 sale.

Their latest Asian art offering on Nov. 11 didn’t quite scale those vertiginous heights, but it did feature a most unusual small 18th-century Chinese famille rose “abstinence plaque.”

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Frances Stark, ‘And Brpptzap the Subject,’ 2005, Collage. Photo courtesy of Greengrassi Gallery, 2009. On view at Nottingham Contemporary until Jan. 10.

London Eye: November 2009

Frances Stark, ‘And Brpptzap the Subject,’ 2005, Collage. Photo courtesy of Greengrassi Gallery, 2009. On view at Nottingham Contemporary until Jan. 10.

Frances Stark, ‘And Brpptzap the Subject,’ 2005, Collage. Photo courtesy of Greengrassi Gallery, 2009. On view at Nottingham Contemporary until Jan. 10.

During the 19th century, the East Midlands city of Nottingham was Britain’s leading center of lace production, an industry that brought great wealth to its mercantile classes but misery to its laboring poor who inhabited what were considered the worst slums in the British Empire outside India. Today, however, the dark satanic mills of Nottingham’s industrial past are but a distant memory, having long since been replaced by an optimistic, forward-thinking approach to urban regeneration.

Until recently this was most evident in the widespread renovation of the city’s grand Victorian buildings and the installation of a sleek tramline linking the main railway station and city center. But now even these initiatives have been nudged into the shadows by a shiny new contemporary art gallery — Nottingham Contemporary — by award-winning British architects Caruso St. John, which opens this week.

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The Seventh Frieze contemporary art fair drew enormous crowds to London's Regents Park this week, despite the lingering recession. Photo ACN.

London Eye: October 2009

The Seventh Frieze contemporary art fair drew enormous crowds to London's Regents Park this week, despite the lingering recession. Photo ACN.

The Seventh Frieze contemporary art fair drew enormous crowds to London’s Regents Park this week, despite the lingering recession. Photo ACN.

Commenting this week on the current state of the world economy, Lloyd C. Blankfein, chairman and chief executive of US investment bank Goldman Sachs, referred to “improving conditions and evidence of stabilization, even growth across a number of sectors.” Judging from the available evidence, one of those sectors might be the art market.

After achieving a four-fold increase in profits, Goldman Sachs is planning to pay out some $5.35 billion in quarterly pay and bonuses to its employees over the coming months. Given that some 5,500 of them are based in London, one cannot help wondering whether any of that freshly generated wealth will be spent on art. Read more

Brigitte Bardot at a photo shoot at the Paris salon of the man who discovered her, the celebrated fashion designer Jean Barthet. Photograph by Sam Levin, late 1960s. Image courtesy James Hyman Gallery, London.

London Eye: September 2009

Brigitte Bardot at a photo shoot at the Paris salon of the man who discovered her, the celebrated fashion designer Jean Barthet. Photograph by Sam Levin, late 1960s. Image courtesy James Hyman Gallery, London.

Brigitte Bardot at a photo shoot at the Paris salon of the man who discovered her, the celebrated fashion designer Jean Barthet. Photograph by Sam Levin, late 1960s. Image courtesy James Hyman Gallery, London.

Almost a year after his epochal £100 million one-man auction at Sotheby’s, the artist Damien Hirst returns to the London limelight in October with a new exhibition titled No Love Lost. Anyone expecting the familiar pickled livestock, pharmaceutical containers or dead butterflies mimicking stained glass windows will be disappointed, however. The 25 new works, to be displayed in the Belle Époque ambience of the Wallace Collection in Manchester Square, are all oil paintings on canvas. What is more – hold the front page! – Hirst painted them all himself. Read more

London Eye: August 2009

The main news in the London trade over the summer holiday season has been the acquisition by Florida-based fairs impresario David Lester of a controlling stake in London’s twice-yearly Olympia International Fine Art & Antiques Fair, formerly run by UK firm Clarion Events.

The news was not exactly a bolt from the blue. Back in June, Lester could be seen patrolling the aisles of both the summer Olympia fair and the doomed Grosvenor House Art & Antiques Fair. As we reported in London Eye last month, this year’s Grosvenor House event, the fair’s seventy-fifth anniversary, turned out to be its last when the hosts, J.W. Marriott Hotels Group, pulled the plug on the fair the day after it closed, surprising everyone including its director.

That led to febrile speculation that a consortium of prominent London antiques dealers, including Mallett, Ronald Phillips and Apter Frederick, were poised to launch a replacement. Asked, in the light of David Lester’s interest in the Olympia Fair, whether London could sustain two major international antiques fairs, Harry Apter admitted to Auction Central News that it was doubtful.
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Fig. 7 - At the Florence Fair in September, Galleria Nella Longari of Milan will show this Head of Apostle, circa 1220, in calcareous sandstone, attributed to a Parisian sculptor.

London Eye: July 2009

Fig. 7 - At the Florence Fair in September, Galleria Nella Longari of Milan will show this Head of Apostle, circa 1220, in calcareous sandstone, attributed to a Parisian sculptor.

Fig. 7 – At the Florence Fair in September, Galleria Nella Longari of Milan will show this Head of Apostle, circa 1220, in calcareous sandstone, attributed to a Parisian sculptor.

“A horrible surprise,” was how Grosvenor House Art & Antiques Fair director Alison Vaissiere (Fig. 1) described the shock decision by the J.W. Marriott Hotels Group to call a halt to the Grosvenor House Fair after 75 successful years at the prestigious Park Lane venue in London.

This year the fair celebrated its Diamond Jubilee. Visitors and exhibitors at the June event were in party mood, confidently expecting the fair to emerge from the recessionary doldrums and return to prosperity. However, the day after the fair closed, the J.W.Marriott Hotels Group, which owns the Grosvenor House Hotel in whose Great Room the fair is held – announced that the event was no longer sufficiently financially viable.

“None of us had any inkling of their intentions,” Ms Vaissiere told Auction Central News. “The fair ended on Wednesday 17th June, and I was told by the hotel’s general manager on Thursday the 18th that it was to close for good. Not even the British Antique Dealers’ Association (BADA), the co-organisers of the event, were aware that the decision had been taken to call a halt.”

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The stand of London furniture dealers Apter Frederick at the Grosvenor House Art & Antiques Fair.

London Eye: June 2009

The stand of London furniture dealers Apter Frederick at the Grosvenor House Art & Antiques Fair.

The stand of London furniture dealers Apter Frederick at the Grosvenor House Art & Antiques Fair.

LONDON – Among those spotted strolling the stands at the glitzy champagne opening of London’s Grosvenor House Art and Antiques Fair this week was Hollywood actor Dustin Hoffman. He seemed to be particularly drawn to the stand of film poster dealers the Reel Poster Gallery, but whether he was in serious buying mood or just taking time out from promoting Last Chance Harvey, his new film with British actress Emma Thompson, was not clear.

Of course, it takes more than a lone star to brighten the dark skies of economic recession, but somehow the charismatic presence of cinema royalty added to the distinctly optimistic buzz at Wednesday’s event.

For the rich and famous, the opening of a big international art fair is as much a social occasion as a shopping opportunity. However, like TEFAF in Maastricht, the Grosvenor House Fair has additional cachet in that it offers an opportunity to see a stunning range of museum-quality objects.

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Oliver Barratt, '40 Ways In, 2009,' on display at Woburn Abbey, Bedfordshire, until July 31. Image Auction Central News.

London Eye: May 2009

Specialist art theft detectives reported this week that a 2-ton Henry Moore bronze Reclining Figure worth £3 million, stolen in December 2005 from the Henry Moore Foundation, was likely melted down at an Essex scrap merchants and the metal sold for a mere £1,500. The theft prompted a tightening of security at the Henry Moore Foundation’s 72-acre estate in Hertfordshire where numerous examples of Moore’s work remain on open air display.

A few months after the Moore theft a three-figure bronze work entitled The Watchers by Lynn Chadwick, valued at around £600,000, was stolen from the grounds of Roehampton University in south-west London. Such high-profile cases focused attention on the risks of displaying sculpture outdoors, forcing many public and private collectors to review their security arrangements.

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Although with some repair, this Continental olivewood and walnut serpentine fronted bureau, probably Maltese, circa 1750, 42 1/2 inches high by 52 inches wide by 22 3/4 inches deep, sold for £10,000 plus premium at Dreweatts in Newbury in January.

London Eye: April 2009

Although with some repair, this Continental olivewood and walnut serpentine fronted bureau, probably Maltese, circa 1750, 42 1/2 inches high by 52 inches wide by 22 3/4 inches deep, sold for £10,000 plus premium at Dreweatts in Newbury in January.

Although with some repair, this Continental olivewood and walnut serpentine fronted bureau, probably Maltese, circa 1750, 42 1/2 inches high by 52 inches wide by 22 3/4 inches deep, sold for £10,000 plus premium at Dreweatts in Newbury in January.

Some economists are warning that the global recession could endure until 2011, but listening to the upbeat message from the UK’s fine art auctioneers you’d be forgiven for doubting that there was even a recession on, let alone one that might continue for the next two years. Asked how the recession is affecting them, an understandable note of caution creeps into most responses, but it’s hard not to conclude from the small straw poll we conducted this week that while business is hardly booming, it’s still surprisingly bright.

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