… Résumé The dismantling of collections attracted a growing audience to the auctions, which took on complementary roles as exhibition venues. Crucially, these urban landmarks enabled a social and visible valuation of artefacts. Behind the … and becoming a hub of connoisseurial debate. Places > Trade Mots-clés Art Audience Collecting Commerce Coffeehouses Exhibitions Auction sales were imported from seventeenth-century Holland, but rapidly became a feature of the British … and as they specialized in sales of cultural goods, they shifted from multipurpose commercial premises to purpose-built exhibition and sales venues – the auction house. Thomas Rowlandson, ‘Christie's Auction Room’, Courtesy of The Lewis …