So Far, So (Really) Good

2007 is nearly at its midpoint, and Indian contemporary art continues to garner great international attention as well as mounting prices. Collectors’ appetite for works by the Progressive Artists’ Group, whether in oils or in other mediums, as well as the current crop of Indian painters seems insatiable, as this recap of major auctions so far this year illustrates.

Osian’s kicked off the year with their Masterpieces and Museum-Quality Series auction January 31 in Mumbai. Not surprisingly, as of late, are paintings surpassing the one-million-dollar mark, as an untitled V. S. Gaitonde did here, going for $1,307,900 USD. Perhaps the most stunning results were the record closing bids for works by Rameshwar Broota, Manjit Bawa, Satish Gujral, Rabindranath Tagore, A. R. Chughtai, G. R. Santosh, Jyoti Bhatt, among others. The final tally brought in just over $9,000,000 for some of the best National Art Treasures and rarest works available for sale.

Christie’s held a sale on February 1, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, where most of the pieces sold at or above their pre-sale estimates. The highest closing bid was for an M. F. Husain, whose popularity seems not to have waned—his Untitled (Woman and Horses) went for $441,600, his Untitled (Saraswati) for $180,000; also selling above their estimates were S. H. Raza’s Rajput House for $307,200, an untitled Jagdish Swaminathan for $240,000, Rameshwar Broota’s That Common Story for $156,000 and an F. N. Souza landscape for $114,000.

B. Prabha’s 2 Girls commanded a respectable $66,000, an untitled painting for $60,000, her Fishergirl $45,600. Others who sold very well include artist Avinash Chandra, whose two untitled watercolors sold for double their estimates, Velu Vishwanadhan, whose untitled casein on canvas went for $26,400—triple the estimate, Ganesh Pyne’s tempera on canvas The Gate, which sold for $72,000, and an untitled self-portrait by Anju Dodiya for $33,600. Also “hot” were works by Jayashree Chakravarty and Justin Ponmany. The 193 lots up for bid brought in a final tally of $9,417,560.

The March 21st morning session of Christie’s Modern and Contemporary Indian Art auction may have witnessed a bit of a new trend as 2007 sales began full-force at Rockefeller Center in New York. Although some Progressive artists’ works sold as well as anticipated, others did not—none failed to reach the million-dollar mark, while many others were passed. What seemed to shift was the impressive numbers garnered by the Masters’ work created from various mediums and pieces by other artists.

A tempera on paper by K. K. Hebbar, estimated at $8,000 to $12,000 went for $28,800; an oil on canvas by the same artist for $78,000, while three works by Satish Gujral sold for $31,200, $50,400, and $60,000, respectively, far surpassing expectations. This wind of change continued throughout the remainder of the sale, with works selling very, very well by B. Prabha ($38,400), Biren De ($54,000), Sakti Burman ($31,200), Anjolie Ela Menon ($90,000), Rameshwar Broota ($186,000), two Bhupen Khakhars’ ($18,000) and ($156,000), Manjit Bawa ($216,000),Ravinder Reddy ($312,000), Anju Dodiya ($72,000), Baiju Parthan ($54,000), Jitish Kallat ($57,600), and T. V. Santhosh ($45,600).

M. F. Husain’s Woman with Veena went for $132,000 with the money donated to Pratham UK and NGO charities aimed at eradicating illiteracy in India. Total sales for the 119 lots available were $8,593,080.

Collectors caught the buying bug Sotheby’s March 22 Indian Art Including Miniatures and Modern Paintings New York auction, snatching up works by Progressive Artists’ Group masters, second and third generation artists, miniatures, and 19th century illustrations. Final tally for the 172 lots up for sale totaled a spectacular $15,007,880 USD.

Two Ram Kumars’ sold in the quarter-million dollar range. Vasudeo S. Gaitonde, whose works have been fetching great prices recently, continued the trend with an untitled oil on canvas selling for $779,200. One piece, an untitled Tyeb Mehta, did break the million-dollar mark on this day, with a final bid of $1,160,000. Also finishing well was Rameshwar Broota’s Captives that sold for $779,200, Arpita Singh’s The Ritual, for $336,000, and works on paper, especially by those of the PAG.

Recent auctions in London showed more of the same (See London Calling: Prices Escalate for Secondary Artists blog below). Indications from these sales seem to suggest that there will be no letup in Indian contemporary art prices as the year rolls on.

London Calling: Prices Escalate for Secondary Artists

During the past few years it has become rather commonplace for the PAG Masters to steal the show at auctions, generating heavy bidding and hefty prices. This might be changing. Last week’s sales held at Christie’s, Bonham’s, and Sotheby’s in London may have signaled a new trend in Indian contemporary art, as works by secondary artists lit up the sales boards.

While continuing to sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars, even more—a Raza went for $1.4 million—many of the works by Souza, Husain, and other legendary painters were passed, seemingly in favor of India’s “second-tier” artists. Names like George Keyt, B. Prabha, Jamil Naqsh, Rameshwar Broota, Jayashree Chakravarty, and Subodh Gupta far surpassed their estimates at Christie’s; at Bonham’s add the names Sakti Burman and Bhupen Khakhar to that list. Paintings by Mukul Chandra Dey, K. C. S. Paniker, Badri Narayan, Sohan Qadri, Satish Gujral, Sheela Gowda, and Justin Ponmany did exceptionally well at Sotheby’s.

Perhaps the average collector is being squeezed out of the market for PAG paintings because of their prices—half of the Souzas’ up for sale at Bonham’s, which included works of various mediums—did not sell. Maybe the torrid love affair for “anything Indian” is driving the secondary market for other less-legendary artists, with speculators betting money that they, too, will become the next hot trend. Whatever the case may be, it can definitely be stated that this genre shows no sign of cooling off.

Time will tell how high prices will climb in auctions during the latter half of 2007. Hopefully, the artists mentioned above, among others, will continue to bask in the art world’s spotlight.

Panchaloha - Sculptures

TamarindArt’s openness to innovative curatorial initiatives resulted in an engaging exhibition “Panchaloha” (on display from May 22nd to June 23rd), which is curated by
Dr. Deepak Kannal (dean of faculty of fine Arts, Baroda, India), representing appealing works by eleven prominent sculptors from Baroda. These works explored interesting modes of expressions, and provided distinct metal and mixed media sculptures from several generations of artists creating delightful spectacle.

Dr. Kannal, himself a sculptor and art historian finds his curatorial venture challenging as
Baroda artists have successfully evaded confinement to a single perception, agenda or ideology. Today Baroda has become a cauldron for contemporary experimentation in visual arts or a meeting ground for various ideas and idioms that are emerging in different part of the country.

Amongst the best of this well presented show are Nagendra Rajbhandari’s “You will have to die too” (Yama), is dark yet visually evocative piece unfolding ephemera nature of human life. Ganesh Gohain’s “Chair of a Thinker” refers to intensely fragile nature of process and currents that shape human thought. K P Soman’s brass sculpture titled “Ethnic Geometry of Measure of absence” shows purity and “lightness” of abstract concept in clear diagrams etched on a shiny, smooth copper surface on which scientific measuring tools and found objects are assembled without loosing their ethnic content, acquiring a subtle aesthetic quality. Last but not least, Soumitra Gouri’s interactive sculptures are absolute delight.