Indian artists rule Christie's art auction

ART ALIVE: Tyeb Mehta's untitled work costs $ 800,000 at Christie's preview from their South Asian Art section.

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New Delhi: The auction house Christie's is in India for the preview of the works from their South Asian Art section, and Indian masters this year share the limelight with young contemporary names.

The auction which has the latest on modern and contemporary art from South Asia, has as many as 132 works by artists, out of which 120 are from Indian artists.

The top slots being quite predictable with the untitled work by Tyeb Mehta at an estimated $ 800,000, and at the same estimate is M F Husain's The Battle of Ganga and Jamuna. In second place is a very rare figurative work titled Vagabond by Ram Kumar at an estimate of $ 600,000.

Interestingly the fresh names from the contemporary lot are taking their share of the large Christie's pie this year.

Christie's Head of Indian Art, Yamini Mehta says, "Jagannath Panda is the one of the highlights that we specifically brought in from New York, Then another artist in this auction is G G Scaria."

At present Indian art is just at the cusp of being brought into the international art category for sales, independent of the South Asian category and the reason for that is — the tremendous growth in profit.

Lisa King the International MD at Chrisite's says, "In the year 2000 we made $ 600,000 and in 2002, we exceeded the million mark. In 2005 we made a record with a painting by Tyeb Mehta actually which made $ 1.6 million , we are at $ 36 million in 2007."

The Christie's preview is currently on in Mumbai at Deutsche Bank, Fort.

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