LONDON.- MacDougall's announced that Olga Vaigatcheva is to join the specialist Russian Art Auction House as Head of Russian Works of Art, Icons and Fabergé. Previously she was Head of Russian Works of Art and Fabergé at Sotheby's, where over eight years she developed the department to be one of the firm's major sales areas.

Catherine MacDougall, Director of MacDougall's, explained "Olga is one of the best known and most respected professionals in the Russian art market. She will definitely strengthen MacDougall's expertise in this area; both our London and Moscow offices are delighted to provide her with their full support".

Olga is a native of St Petersburg, with degrees from the St Petersburg State University, Sotheby's Institute of Art, and the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. As she is a Chinese speaker, MacDougall's also hope she will help develop the Chinese market for Russian Art.

MacDougall's next auction of Russian Art, Works of Art, Icons, and Faberge will take place in London on 27 November 2013.

MacDougall’s is the only fine art auction house to specialise exclusively in Russian art. The biannual sales during London’s Russian Art Week in June and December feature works by Russian masters from the 19th to the 21st century, works on paper, icons and works of art. We were the first international auction house with a representative in Moscow and are still the only one with a representative in Kiev.

MacDougall’s has developed an extensive client base in Russia and the CIS, nurturing close relationships with collectors, and we regularly take preview exhibitions to both Moscow and Kiev. All staff members are Russian speakers and we collaborate with leading Russian art experts, institutions and artists.

The Russian art market has shown exceptional signs of recovery since April 2009 and continues to go from strength to strength. What remains clear is that there is significant demand for high quality works and in 2012 alone MacDougall’s sold four works over the million-pound mark. For each of the last three years, annual sales have totalled over £20 million and we have established several new world records, including record auction prices for works by Ilya Repin, Zinaida Serebriakova and Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin.

Since the firm’s founding in 2004, MacDougall’s has risen to become one of the three world leaders in Russian art at auction and now holds a quarter of the global market. With plans for growth and expansion into several areas including private treaty sales and the opening of a new Moscow office, MacDougall’s looks set to build upon previous successes in 2013.