London’s pre-contemporary art market gets boost from two new summer events

Two new events for pre-contemporary art debut in London next week, both aimed at promoting keeping the market for historical art energised in this traditionally key time of year in the capital.

The gallery trail Classic Art London (CAL, 23 June to 4 July) steps into the vacuum left by London Art Week (LAW)—which ran for the final time in 2024 after ten years in operation—with exhibitions spread around Mayfair and St. James’s, Cecil Court and Belgravia.

It is the brainchild of Silke Lohmann and Pippa Roberts, who previously did LAW’s PR and marketing (though the two are entirely separate events). “We always believed in London Art Week and were saddened that it closed down at the end of last year,“ Lohmann tells The Art Newspaper. “With the encouragement and support of many of the LAW dealers, Pippa and I decided to offer a PR and marketing campaign to fill the gap. We felt that it was important to show a strong front in the current, constantly changing climate and ensure London stays on the art world map at this time of year.”

Curators encouraged the duo to put on a talks programme too, with several taking place on 30 June at The Society of Antiquaries, on topics such as shared ownership in the art world, climate change and the rise of private museums in Latin America.

Exhibitions include The Spirit of Place at Daniel Katz Gallery, a solo show of landscapes by the British artist Paul Nash; a rediscovered Titian, Madonna and Child with St. Mary Magdalene (around 1555-60) on show for the first time in London at Trinity Fine Art; five 18th century works by Thomas Jones, on the market for the first time ever with Karen Taylor Fine Art, and Re-Imagining Cubism at Ben Elwes Fine Art, which takes a fresh look at the movement and includes work by the Swedish Cubo-Futurist Gösta Adrian-Nilsson (1884-1965), known as GAN.

“There are also some wonderful academic discoveries and less well-known artists being given a moment in the light,” Roberts adds. “We have all been working together to get Classic Art London going and it’s been a real pleasure to see a collegial event coming together.”

Little-known on the international stage, GAN is credited with introducing abstraction to Scandinavia after a stint in Berlin from 1913-16. His shift to pure abstractionism came on his return to Stockholm in 1916, and—perhaps exacerbated by the fact that he was gay—his avant garde work often drew criticism in more conservative Sweden.

Rachel Elwes, a director at Ben Elwes Fine Art, explains that she and her husband, Ben, travel frequently to Scandinavia and have sold numerous paintings by artists from the region to both museums and private collectors. “I was on a visit to Sweden a couple of years ago when I was wandering through a regional museum and my eyes were suddenly drawn to a striking Cubist painting,” she says. “It was by an artist who is widely celebrated in Sweden, but about whom I knew very little: Gösta Adrian-Nilsson, aka GAN. I couldn’t stop thinking about the painting so when I returned to London, we started researching more about him, his story, and his market.”

Elwes adds that, as far as she is aware, GAN’s work has never been shown in the UK: “This is despite him travelling widely in his own lifetime: in 1913 he moved to Berlin where he was influenced by the works of Franz Marc and Wassily Kandinsky, and after the Great War he moved to Paris where he befriended Leger and Archipenko.”

The couple sought out three GAN works from private Scandinavian collections—including the monumental work Seglatsen (Sail) from 1918—to form a focal point of their Re-Imagining Cubism exhibition during CAL. Prices for works in the exhibition range from $25,000 to around €2m.

Meanwhile, at Spencer House in St James’s, Studiolo, a showcase for art, antiquities and sculpture, sets up for one day only on 26 June. This bijou, polished pop-up has been founded by Sebastien Paraskevas and Alesa Boyle who in 2023, along with Tom Neville, co-founded Trois Crayons, the specialist drawings and works on paper group selling exhibition. The second edition of Trois Crayons, titled Tracing Time, also opens this week, running from 26 June to 5 July at Frieze No.9 Cork Street, with 35 participating galleries showing over 250 drawings from the 15th to 21st centuries.

Studiolo’s concept has shades of The Eye of the Collector events, now “on pause”, but with a shorter run and more historical focus. Studiolo has been produced in partnership with the interior design firm Sibyl Colefax and John Fowler, who will take the creative lead for the display. The Studiolo founders have brought on Amelia Tomlinson (née Higgins), the director of London Art Week until 2023, to direct the event.

It is intentionally small—just 13 galleries will take part, each showing only two works. Exhibitors include many Tefaf Maastricht regulars and former LAW participants, such as Tomasso, Agnews, Charles Ede, Stephen Ongpin Fine Art and The Weiss Gallery. “Galleries have been delighted by Studiolo’s new addition to the art world calendar and its one day/one evening duration, as well as the collaboration with Sibyl Colefax & John Fowler,” say Boyle and Tomlinson in a joint statement provided to The Art Newspaper. “The historical venue of Spencer House, rather than a tent or own premises, has also generated excitement and intrigue.”

The event happens on the same day as the opening preview of the third edition of Treasure House Fair at the Royal Hospital Chelsea, the former site of Masterpiece London. Asked how Studiolo positions itself alongside events like this and CAL, Boyle and Tomlinson say: “We don’t have a fixed position in the market, we are a new venture focused on ephemeral collaborations in ever-changing cities and buildings throughout the year, which allow us to engage new audiences at each edition. Our inaugural event at Spencer House is just the beginning.”

One participant is the London-based sculpture specialist Stuart Lochhead. Studiolo, he says, “feels like a fresh and exciting initiative—one that brings together a carefully curated group of dealers in an inspiring historical setting.” He adds: “The one-day format adds a sense of urgency and focus, especially welcome at a time when there’s so much happening in the city…June has traditionally been a key moment for the historical art market in London, and Studiolo is a compelling addition to that landscape.”

Lochhead will exhibit a bronze statuette of a Leaping Horse by the Florence-born, London-based Francesco Fanelli—produced at Charles I’s court—and Jean-Joseph Carries’ grotesque Mask which mixes French Gothic and Japanese ceramic traditions, and sits “at the intersection of the ‘applied’ and ‘high’ arts”, Lochhead says. Mask is priced at £100,000 and the horse, £35,000.

Overall, prices at the event range broadly, from four to seven figures.