Indian art goes cheap at Christie's

For now, the punters have been proved right. The sluggish art market for Indian modern and contemporary saw little hopes of a revival at the Christie’s auction of South Asian art in London on Wednesday, with most of the 76 (of 96 lots) sold well within their estimated value.

The star of the show was a 1960 M F Husain oil on canvas (Ragamala Series) that fetched a price of $649,504 (Rs 3.1 crore), on the lower end of its estimate. Rashid Rana’s Red Carpet 4 chromogenic print found a buyer, again within its estimate, at $286,534 (Rs 1.3 crore), while only Ram Kumar (Untitled, oil on canvas) surpassed his estimated value by approximately three times to sell at $217,864 (Rs 1 crore).

Not much was anticipated from the auction, and to that extent it did not disappoint. The more important forthcoming auction in terms of quality of works is now the Sotheby’s sale on June 16, also in London. Bidders anticipate it might generate livelier interest since the quality of works is marginally better, though they say some of the works on offer have been in previous auctions last year.

An interesting pointer at both sales is works consigned by European collectors – clearly a case of poor picks, or an economy going bust.