The 400 million dollar Indian art market is treading a new path after the recent market fluctuations.
While the prices
have become realistic, the future of the growth in Indian art, say connoisseurs, dealers and art industry watchers, lie in the hands of
collectors.
Art magazines and publications- a spate of which has flooded the market- are also playing an important role in educating buyers by highlighting “good and unusual art” to a wider cross section.
“Till six months back, no big ticket art was selling after the boom of 2005-2008 (the first quarter of 2008). The period between 2005-2006 fly-by-night curators and investors throng the market. They created hype in the media about works by a clutch of artists, mostly
contemporary ones, resulting in less of collection and more speculation,” Vikram Bachhawat, director the leading Kolkata-based house auction house Emami Chisel Art and director of the Aakriti Art Gallery, said.
Bachhawat was in the capital to launch his new art magazine, Artetc.
The auctioneer and art promoter said media hype prompted a “unrealistic price rise of young art”.
“Works by younger artists with start-up prices of Rs 200,000 shot up to Rs 2 million in six months because of false bids by some galleries on their own works in auction houses. It was a fraud being played on the market. The meltdown has exposed the fraud and prices are now plummeting to normal. Buyers are cautious,” Bachhawat explained.
Delhi-based psychiatrist-turned-leading art collector Mahesh Chandra said “prices of contemporary art has fallen by at least 50-60 per cent while those of modern masters have scaled down by at least 30 per cent (quoting ArtPrice.com estimates)”.
“The prices of art works by contemporary artists, who were established through auctions between 2002-2008, were bid up (increased artificially). Money was free-flowing and the same artists - 15-20 of them – kept reappearing in auction after auction commanding prices as high as Rs 10 million to Rs 20 million. There was a disconnect between artistic achievements and prices. It had to be corrected,” Chandra said.
Collectors, who are flocking to the market to reap the benefits of price correction, also are buying rare works, Bachhawat said.
“We recently sold a work by a not-so-investor-friendly rare Bengal artist Dharmanarayan Dasgupta at twice the estimate,” the auctioneer said. He expects the market to pick up next year.
The recession, said curator Bhavna Kakar, has edged out investors and has turned the spotlight on collectors.
“The price and hype bubble have burst,” entrepreneur-author and art connoisseur Pavan Malhotra, who has co-authored the high-end coffee table book, “Elite Collectors of Modern and Contemporary Indian Art”, said.
“I think the stature and market for Indian art globally will grow if top international collectors seriously start collecting Indian art. The top 10 collectors of art in the world collect Chinese art. Only a handful like adman-connoisseur Charles Saatchi (who has a gallery of Indian art in London), American hedge fund manager Steven Cohen, business tycoons Elaine and Steven Wynn and French billionaire Francois Pinault have started collecting Indian art two years ago. Unless big names like US-based millionaire collectors Elie Broad and David Giffen start collecting Indian art, the market will not grow in terms of quality and we will not be able to compete with China, our biggest competitor in Asia. Collectors will gradually steer the Indian art market,” Malhotra said.
The Indian Art Market, explained veteran art critic and the former editor of the Lalit Kala Akademi journal Amit Mukhopadhyay, the editor of Artetc, had never been structured.
“It is hazardous like a jungle raj. The kind of purchase that went on in the Indian art market was senseless and did not do justice to artists,” Mukhopadhyay said.
Art publications will play a significant role in in educating buyers in the future, said Mukhopadhayay, whose magazine Artetc has a collector's corner to reach out to prospective buyers.
Concurs senior artist Vivan Sundaram: “Art magazines are very important. But to reflect all aspects of art activity, it has to have criticality. There is so much that goes on in the name of young and new. An art magazine can educate buyers in a larger context.”
With Artetc, India now has a sumptuous kitty of art magazines like Art India, Art & Deal and the online India Art Summit newsletter India ArtConnect.
There are two more art publications on the cards. “I am going to launch my art magazine 'Take' in October and veteran artist Jogen Chowdhury is working on his new magazine 'Art East'. It will help collectors and buyers acquire better perspectives,” curator Bhavna Kakar said.