Tim Cornwell: Unusual auction set to rock the house

Published on Wednesday 27 May 2009 20:32

AS THE art world wonders which auction houses might step into the breach left by Sotheby's and Christie's untactful retreat from Scotland, Lyon and Turnbull has pulled off a blazing coup.

For those missing the annual summer jaunt to Sotheby's cancelled Gleneagles sale, L&T is boldly putting on an auction of the UK's largest private collection of meteorites in August.

Robert Elliott, pictured, who lives in Fife, has been a space nut since the age of eight and the Apollo II moon landing. An electronics engineer working on military defence systems, he bought his first piece of meteorite in the mid-1990s, and built up his collection partly as he bought to slice up and sell on.

The sale includes over 170 items, including part of the Hambleton meteorite, which he discovered, weighing 18.7kg and estimated at 60-90,000. Makes a change from art and antiques.

Sounds dodgy

HOT off the press from the Spin marketing firm... a Nessie sighting announced by the touring cast of 'Allo 'Allo. While cruising Loch Ness last week on a break from performing at the Eden Court Theatre in Inverness, their boat, the good ship Jacobite Queen, picked up five strange shapes on its sonar screen.

According to Captain John Askew, it was the first-time in his 15 years working on the Loch that he had successfully picked up images of this kind on any of the Jacobite fleet's sonar screens.

The images have now been sent for scientific analysis. On closer investigation, will scientists see the blurry outlines of a murky publicity stunt? Adrian Shine, an expert in sonar who has been studying Loch Ness since 1973, calls it a "genuine sonar contact". You couldn't make this stuff up...

Jen nets top prize

EDINBURGH University student Jen Campbell took her book group to a step beyond your average New Town ladies' gathering. The English graduate's online book club grew so popular it pulled in over 5,000 people in its forums, talking books and posting comments online, with members from Australia to Finland ranging in age from 13 to 50.

Yesterday Campbell won the 2009 Penguin Orange Readers' Group Prize, worth 1,000. She said she was "over the moon". Author Kate Mosse, who chose the final winner, praised "her commitment to making reading, often a private passion, as social and community based as possible... it's interesting to see this new generation of online reading groups in virtual spaces, rather than taking place in workplaces or members' homes."