Chch history popular

Press, 7 April 1979, Page 24

Chch history popular

Sydney interests have been buying small pieces of Canterbury’s early history at a fine-art auction in Christchurch this week. Mr C. F. Hart, of N. H. McCrosties, fine-art auctioneers, said that his firm’s! triannual auction, held in the Horticultural Hall, had attracted buyers from Sydney for the first time who had outbid the Canterbury Museum for certain historical items. The buyers had included “the eminent Sydney ceramic authority,” Mr Stanley Lipscombe. The Australians' interest had been in items relating to the early history of Canterbury, mostly pre--1850 ceramics. One of the pieces which: went to Sydney was a large ironze medallion, issued by the then Christchurch firm • sf G. Coates, and Company, ; tommemorating the inter-1 orovincial exhibition held in: Christchurch in 1872. Thei ■nedallion showed various motifs in relief, including the New Zealand coat-of-arms. agricultural and pastoral items, a native palm tree, and representations of the moa and kiwi. Another piece to go to Sydney was an engraved , brass plate used for printing the original trade cards of ,

“I the early colonial Canterfl bury firm of Tippetts, Silk tland Heywood, of Lyttelton, -! general commission agents i and proprietors of the . I Adelphi Stores. The plate - went with a printer’s “pull” >|of the trade card on thej i back of a sheet from an old: 1 day book. Mr Hart said that items of > historical interest which had 7 gone to Sydney had come - from the estate of a descendant of one of Canterbury’s 1 earliest families. The cost of : the two items had been rela- • lively small ($17.50 for the ' medallion and $22 for the ; plate) and he -felt it was al 1 “shame that Canterbury people let them go.” The Sydney buyers had paid more for the ceramics. ■ They were keen on early ’ ceramics, whereas most New! Zealand buyers were more! [interested in modern Royal! [Worcester. i Mr Hart said he had! i nevertheless been pleased to! see the Sydney buyers at the sale, which had been a very buoyant one. A total of 271 items had been offered. Those which had sold particularly well had been sil- ■ ver and silver-plated items, glass, ceramics, furniture, I and oriental cloisonne works . (made either in China or Japan). :

Some of the best prices : were: a large nineteenth-cen- , tury glazed earthenware Chinese bowl, $450; an early twentieth-century large floating bowl in clear, heavy Lalique glass in a chrysanthe- •| mum pattern, $l5O, a Sheffield ! coffee pot, $375; a four-piece silver-plated tea service, $260; a pair of silver-gilt Victorian serving spoons, $190; a Royal Bayreuth tea service of 18 pieces, $410; t w o nineteenth-century handled Austrian vases, 21.5 cm high, $425; a bronze German shepherd dog, 37cm high, $465. ; In furniture, top prices were paid for an early Victorian walnut settee, with a carved and fretted back, I.Bm long, $800; a folding Victorian card table in walnut, I $1150; a mid-Victorian figjured walnut corner whattnot, $550; and a mid-nine-[teenth century Biedermeyer I double-ended chaise-longue lin mahogany, $l2OO. Two of the most expensive paintings in the auction were an F. W. Scarborough water-colour, “Woolwich Reach, London,” which fetched $425, and a David Bates oil, “Langherne Brook,” which realised $4OO. A T. Peerless water-colour, “Lake Scene,” also realised $4OO.