There’s a Husain on the walls of Ram Murthy Ahuja’s office, a glass-fronted room that looks out on the large, well-lit room that functions as the workshop of Ahuja Framers. Done in black ink on paper, the sketch depicts two of the painter’s favourite subjects — Ganesh and the dancing girl — peeping out of a picture frame. On the left is written “Murti” and below is the famous signature in two languages, Hindi and English.
Keeping Husain company is a sketch by Arpita Singh, India’s preeminent women painter, of a man sitting stiff on a chair, and “Murti the frame-maker” written below. Next to it is a sketch by senior painter Paramjit Singh, one of his characteristic landscapes done in tiny flecks of black, with “For Murti” written in a corner. A mock advertisement takes another frame nearby — “Acid Free Backing Board; Archival Framing; Only at Ahuja Framers — Dayanita Singh”. And that’s not the most effusive of testimonials of Ahuja’s skill as a framer of fine art works, all those paintings that are today traded for lakhs and crores. “Artist among framers” writes Vivek Vilasini, well-known contemporary artist, a sentiment that Sunil Gupta, another well-known, internationally-acclaimed photographer, echoes with the line, “Before there is a photograph, there is the frame.”
“With all of these artists I have relationships that go back many years, even decades” says Ahuja. “They come here and chat for hours. Most of them are very particular about the frame they want and sit with me for hours, working out the exact colour they want, the tint, the width of the frame. And artists are very particular about what they want. Just recently, Dayanita Singh and I sat for three days working on a specific shade of grey that she wanted for the frame of her black and white photographs.”
And it isn’t just Singh, India’s best-known photographer abroad, that Ahuja is so accommodating with. Anjum Singh, a Delhi-based painter, recalls how some years ago “Murtiji spent hours fixing hundreds of metal lips to the frame that was part of the work”.
Clearly, it’s a symbiotic relationship with artists that has helped Ahuja grow the business from the small shop in Paharganj, started by his father in 1948, which made frames of pictures of gods and goddesses. “I started helping out my father in his shop in 1972 when I was in class VIII.” The connection with artists began early with Manjit Bawa, who would come to the Paharganj shop “because his school was nearby”. Among other senior artists who were Ahuja’s early clients are Bimal Dasgupta, Phalguni Dasgupta and Dhiraj Choudhury. “It paid very little then. I remember my father once pulled me up for spending too much. We would spend Rs 1,500 for a frame that we would get only Rs 500 for.”
The turn in fortunes happened with the boom in the art market in the ‘90s when the prices of art works went through the roof. “Art works worth crores needed frames that were classy,” says Ahuja. “The rest was word of mouth. Husain saab, for instance, saw the gold-leaf covered frame I had made and said that he wanted a similar one.” That was in the ‘90s, and Ahuja went on to work with the iconic painter on many of his large shows in India and abroad. These days, there’s custom coming his way from all over India and abroad as well.
Ahuja has also kept up with technology and trends and invested in sophisticated machines for better finishes. “We do archival framing [using acid-free paper and materials which absorb moisture and prevent damage to the art-work]. For the past one year, we have also started using museum glass [which prevents reflection].” It’s expensive — a 2’X2’ frame can cost as much as Rs 17,000. But, says Ahuja, “it’s our skill with our hands that sets us apart. And it’s cheaper here; the same effect abroad would cost far more.”
Artists and connoisseurs today know that.