Auctioneers

One of the more unusual items on offer at Tennants’ (20% buyer’s premium) Summer Fine Sale was a lock of hair from the 19th century nursing pioneer Florence Nightingale (1820-1910). It was thought to have been cut in 1883 when she was 63 years old.

This Celtic silver ‘ribbon’ torc, or armlet was made – perhaps in Ireland – sometime in the period between c.500BC-500AD.

While the famous railway poster featuring the Jolly Fisherman (see ATG No 2653) promoted Skegness, the example shown here was intended to tempt holidaymaker to another Lincolnshire seaside resort.

Leading several modestly pitched highlights at Ewbank’s (25% buyer’s premium) in Surrey last month was this signed charcoal portrait of a girl by Welsh painter Augustus John (1878-1961).

Swiss collectors were in a generous mood at Koller’s (25/22/15% buyer’s premium) recent Zurich auction.

German artist Hans Bellmer (1902-75) explored themes of desire, sexuality and the subconscious mind through his surrealistic sculptures, drawings and photographs.

Spotlight on copy sold in superb Strutz collection – plus a look at other recent results for the Tolkien classic

Works on paper by Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) are regularly strong sellers at Austrian auctions, but even so, the result for one of his coloured pencil drawings at a Dorotheum (30/25% buyer’s premium) sale in Vienna was quite a surprise.

William Strutz’s library built within his home in Bismarck, North Dakota, consisted of some 15,000 books, which the attorney began assembling while in college in the late 1950s

Oil sketch appears at auction two decades on but overall the artist’s premium works are in short supply