Our May 2026 Newsletter

Jan & John Maggs

Antiques and Art

Our May Newsletter

We've just returned home from three weeks in London, the Cotswolds, Belgium, and Paris. Buying was especially good, and our museum and restaurant hopping kept our brains and our bellies very satisfied.

Now that we're back, we're balancing Spring yard and garden work with preparations for our post-travel Opening. There will be a significant change in this year's opening, which you can read about below.

In this month's newsletter we're also reporting on a very special show that we visited while in Ghent - an exhibition of works by lesser-known painters of the Dutch golden Age who shared a common quality: their gender. There's also the re-run of a 2008 story involving the sale of an early chandelier which UPS delivered (sort of) to a customer in Texas. Finally, this month's Back Page compares two paintings we saw on our trip - one in Paris and one in London - perhaps shedding light on the existence of period copies of masterworks.

We hope you'll enjoy it all.

Our Spring Post-England Opening

The New Format

Because we've found such treasure during the past few months and on our recent time in England, we feel that we have more fresh inventory than we should introduce in the single weekend of our opening. This surfeit has led us to conclude that we need to post our new stock in two sessions, rather than the traditional single show. Here's the plan:

On May 16 & 17 we'll offer The Best of the Best - 80 stars from all inventory categories. Then, three weeks later, on June 6 & 7, we'll offer The Best of the Rest, 50 more pieces from all categories, including many of our favorites, with a somewhat lower median cost.

Look for an email at 10:00 on each of these two Saturdays. We'll also email reminders a few days before each.

Women Artists from Antwerp to Amsterdam - 1600 - 1750

Entering the exhibition in the Museum of Fine Arts in Ghent.

The banners hanging over our heads contain the names of the forty women artists and artisans whose work is on display inside.

Click the picture to join us in this exceptional show.

Notes From Our Past

A brass chandelier - a UPS delivery in Texas - a clown-show cover-up.

Click the picture to read

The Tale of the Incredible Airborne Chandelier

The Back Page

On the eve of our return home, we took the tube to Trafalgar Square for our second April visit to The National Gallery. (Three weeks earlier, we'd spent most of our visit in an exhibition of the chiaroscuro style of Joseph Wright of Derby, which we plan to feature in next month's newsletter.) This morning we visited the museum's wonderful collection of Dutch Masters. Halfway through our wander Jan stopped in front of a painting from the workshop of Marinus van Reymerswale, and pointed out that we had seen it two days earlier - in The Louvre! Fortunately, we had photographed the first painting, so we're able to present the two for comparison. Click the picture for a look.

Jan & John Maggs Antiques and Art

www.jmaggs.com