Antique Valuations For UK Probate

The popularity of buying Art Deco at auction surfaced for the first time in the late 1960's when the major London auction houses began to respond to a revival of interest in this stylish and iconic period. For a twenty year period from the end of the second world war, the Deco style had had been viewed Read more [...]

Ancient coins have great artistic merit and are relatively easy to obtain in Australia, being one of the few classes of antiquities that are within anyone's financial reach. As well as satisfying the basic human instinct to collect, and having the potential to be financially rewarding, such coins are Read more [...]

Many would not be aware that like the Buddhism of Tibet, Mongolian Buddhism shares the same articles of faith and the same mystic means of expression. Like the Tibetans, the Mongolians celebrated their religious life through exquisite paintings, magnificent sculptures in bronze, wood and clay. They also Read more [...]

The Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum is holding an exhibition surveying an important but neglected period of printmaking in Italy. In contrast to the situation in the early sixteenth century, a marked feature of the period 1550-1620 is the mass-production of prints, and the rise Read more [...]

Towards the end of his life, Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) donated his collection to the French nation. As well as works by his contemporaries, and Greek and Roman antiquities, Rodin's collection included an enormous number of his own plasters and thousands of drawings. In his three-part donation were also Read more [...]

The theory of natural selection is grounded in the belief that each new variety and ultimately each new species, is produced and maintained by having some advantage over those with which it comes into competition; and the consequent extinction of less favoured forms inevitably follows. Charles Darwin, Read more [...]

One of the most exotic and intriguing figures in the Old Testament is the legendary Queen of Sheba. Although her visit to the court of King Solomon is only mentioned briefly in the Books of Kings and Chronicles,1 her stature in the Bible, and her subsequent impact on the imagination of writers and artists Read more [...]

As collectors of Japanese ceramics know, most of what used to be called 'Ko-Kutani (old Kutani) ware'-early Japanese porcelain with darkish overglaze enamel decoration-is now catalogued as 'Arita ware, Ko-Kutani style/type'. This new term applies to a square porcelain bottle with a design of landscape Read more [...]

Thanks to an upsurge in scholarship over the past few decades devoted to the career and significance of Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin (1812-52), recognition of his seminal role in the development of nineteenth-century architecture and applied art is now assured. For Pugin the revival of Gothic architecture Read more [...]

Though primarily thought of as a designer in metal, William Arthur Smith Benson (1854-1924) was comfortable designing furniture in wood, metal and most famously, wood and metal combined. He designed both simple artisan furniture and complex luxury furnishings. His career as a furniture designer can Read more [...]