Petworth Park Antiques & Fine Art Fair
17th to 19th May 2024
The Petworth Park Antiques & Fine Art Fair returns for three days in May to the grounds of the National Trust’s Petworth House, Petworth, West Sussex from Friday 17 to Sunday 19 May 2024. Unusually, this event has taken place successfully every year since its inception, despite having to move dates on more than one occasion, last year as a result of King Charles III’s coronation. Even in 2020 and 2021, when the fair had to move months to take place safely during the pandemic, this fair has always been extremely well attended by collectors, interior designers, south of England residents and others from around the UK and abroad. Brilliantly supported by the local market town, which looks forward to this annual event with much anticipation, the businesses in Petworth put on a great show for the influx of visitors and this year will be no exception.
Some 60 exhibitors are gathering in the purpose-built marquee with their latest and finest stock. Tom Rooth is currently in the Cambrian mountains of Wales creating his honeycomb to create a buzz on his stand for his tremendously popular hand drawn ceramics. Honeycomb by Tom Rooth, comprises a number of individually underglazed pencil on glazed earthenware, surrounded by wooden frames covered in 23.5 carat gold leaf, signed, numbered, inscribed and dated (on the reverse). Queen bees are fired with gold lustre and are priced at £225 (the bees are £195 each), with £10 of each piece sold going to the Wildlife Trusts.
Gladwell & Patterson is returning having debuted at this fair last May, where contemporary British artist Peter Symonds proved most popular. The success of Symonds’ paintings has encouraged him to paint a series of paintings around West Sussex and his home county of Surrey and Gladwell & Patterson is delighted to confirm that he will be on their stand over the course of the weekend as artist-in-residence. One such painting, Bosham Harbour, has already been completed and is planned for display ticketed at £8,500. A highlight on the stand was painted by local artist Ivon Hitchens (1893-1979). Wildflower Wood is an oil on canvas abstract landscape by Hitchen, painted towards the end of his life, in 1975, after he had left London for Lavington Common, very close to Petworth, and is priced at £`160,000.
Jeroen Markies Art Deco has an impressive selection of Art Deco and mid-century furniture and accessories for sale, amongst which is a pair of French mid-century moustache backed club chairs in vintage green leather upholstery, circa 1940 and a pair of French Art Deco club chairs, moustache backed with studded back and walnut feet in vintage green leather upholstery £4,250; an Art Deco Woburn sideboard by Gordon Russell, designed by Dick Russell in 1933, £2,650; as well as a satin birch veneered cocktail cabinet, £4,650 and a burr walnut writing desk, £3,450, both by Heal’s of London, circa 1935.
Ottocento has a gallery in the centre of Petworth and also takes a stand at the fair and is bringing an offset lithograph in colours Studies of the Human body, signed by Frances Bacon (Irish, 1909-1992) and numbered 182/250, 1980, £5,200 and Portrait of Madame Raoul Dufy, gouache on paper, signed, inscribed and dated ‘à ma femme Raoul Dufy 1915’ by Raoul Dufy (French, 1877-1953), £25,000.
Tickets to the fair are £10 each, including a catalogue and re-admission, through Eventbrite. The tickets include complimentary access to visit Petworth House and view some of the nation’s treasures during the three days of the fair. In a reciprocal arrangement, National Trust members can visit the fair free-of-charge.
As usual, there will be light refreshments available in the fair, an antiques fair courtesy bus taking people to and from the centre of Petworth and parking is free for antiques fair visitors right outside the marquee.
The Marquee
Petworth House and Park
Petworth
GU28 0QY
United Kingdom