Aesthetic value

In Conversation: Roddy Ropner, director of business development, Christie's Asia and India.

Christie's, UK's premier auction house brand, is keener than ever on the potential in India. Roddy Ropner, director of business development, Christie's Asia and India, talks to Arati Menon Carroll about the importance of re-establishing Christie's presence in a market that has the world's attention again after a long time

On why Christie's decided to end the hiatus:

Christie's association with Indian art goes back to James Christie's first sale in 1766. Since 1995, we've been the only international auction house to have a presence in India.

We've sourced here; we've solicited buyers here, but never actually conducted an auction here (except for charity auctions). I suspect we're still able to find Indian art globally, but sourcing from the Indian market is still very important.

On the importance of contemporary Indian art:

The contemporary art category as a whole has leapfrogged our classical art and other categories that were our mainstay. When I joined Christie's 20 years ago, the department everybody wanted to be a part of was the impressionist art (19th and early 20th) department and now everyone wants to join contemporary art.

Similarly, Indian contemporary art has gained tremendous prominence. The first sale of modern and contemporary Indian art in New York in 2000 totalled $643,427. Five years later, the sale realised $8.6 million.

Due to the growing strength of the category, we are introducing two separate sales of just contemporary Indian art in New Year each year. The first sale will have 166 lots, the largest offering by an international auction house and we estimate a total sale value of $7-9 million.

On buyers for Indian contemporary art:

The historic sale of Tyeb Mehta's works "" first in 2002, which surpassed the $100,000 level for an Indian painting at an auction, and then again in 2005, which broke the $1-million barrier at an auction "" just further accelerated interest in Indian modern art.

Traditionally, a lot of buyers have been NRIs and collectors from North America and Europe. More recently we've seen non-resident Chinese buyers.

On classical Indian art:

There still seems to be interest, mostly European collectors for classical Indian art and we will feature Indian art like Khmer and Chola sculptures and Himalayan bronzes in exhibitions in New York, London, Dubai and Hong Kong this year.

On the other side, I am also hoping we will start generating interest among Indian buyers for all our categories from jewellery to watches, furniture, and even western categories of art, and not just contemporary Indian art.

On contemporary art from the rest of Asia:

One of the broadest and most exciting contemporary art markets we have in Asia is China. Interestingly, the art market in China is completely driven by auction houses; there are no art galleries.

In the last year, we've introduced contemporary Indonesian, contemporary Korean and contemporary Japanese art. Japan and Korean contemporary art markets are not on the same growth trajectory as China and India though.

On whether India will hear the hammer strike:

There's a lot of legal groundwork we have to do before selling art here. We're looking at new opportunities everywhere and I don't doubt the strength of the buyer's market here. Our newest sale location is Dubai; we'd look at China and India.