The fall and rise of the art mart

With newer auction houses debuting in the space of modern and contemporary art, collectors could gain

It must have been about a decade ago when I stumbled, quite literally, into Dukan in Bangalore, after cajoling various people into pointing out places that dealt in antiques. Interestingly, most such places in what was then still the Garden City, operated from homes, so you had to ring doorbells, state your intent, answer cross-sounding queries from servants before being let in, and Dukan was no exception.

Except, here was no artificially weathered furniture masquerading as the old thing; the ceramic collection and a few other pieces were genuine finds, and there were enough mounted etchings and lithographs to keep you engrossed, even if you got the feeling that old books had paid the price to end up on collectors' walls instead of in the hands of readers.

This week, Dukan gave birth to its next sibling: the pretentious sounding Bid & Hammer, an auction house with M Maher Dadha as its chairman and managing director. The Dadhas, entrepreneurial immigrants from Rajasthan with a history of dealing in chiefly pharmaceuticals, were also keen buyers from the rajwadas of yore, ending up with a fabulous collection of jewellery and collectible art.

In Delhi, where he previewed selected works that were auctioned on Thursday in Bangalore, Dadha says his interest was never triggered from the point of view of selling anything. It was, he says, his wife who started dealing in a bit of antiquarian stuff in the mid-nineties in a purely amateurish way.

Later, he decided it could be a full-fledged business opportunity, and following the success of auction houses in the past years, set things in motion towards this, his first auction which flags off his expectation of doing 4-5 sales annually to begin with, growing to 10-12 sales in a couple of years time.

Dadha's optimism notwithstanding, and in spite of the auction boom in India, he may have a tougher time of it than expected, and not only on account of the new entrants getting into the space.

In recent years, Bowrings has come to grief, allegedly falling foul of the law "" the case is in court, and Patrick Bowrings expects to be fully cleared of any irregularities. Even Osian's has not escaped the taint of grey-area regulations, but there is no gainsaying that it and Saffronart between them have created the market (and benchmarked skyrocketing prices in the process) for auctions of Indian art.

Internationally, Christie's, Sotheby's and Bonhams have conducted sales in New York, London, Hong Kong and Dubai, mostly successfully. But back home, Apparao has had somewhat less success though it has built itself up steadily thereafter, and the hyped launch of Nina Pillai's Triveda has been unable to sustain any promise.

Still, it has not been able to inhibit other entrants from foraying into a market currently estimated at around Rs 500 crore. In Delhi, Naren Bhiku Ram Jain's Art Mall has plans for a series of auctions. And in Kolkata, Emami Chisel Art, which will have its own gallery this month, will debut with its first auction of modern and contemporary art next month.

But unlike the others, ECA (as it prefers to label itself) is hoping to leverage transparency and tax rebates to its advantage. Kolkata, unlike other centres, does not levy the 12.5 per cent VAT on art, thereby saving collectors a chunk of money in the process.

In addition, says Vikram Bachhawat, director, "We will not accept any works from contemporary artists that are less than three years old" "" traditionally, works wet with paint from artists' studios have been consigned to auctions "" "and except in the rarest of cases, will not accept anything for auction that has itself been auctioned within the previous seven years."

That, should you be curious, is to kill speculation and quell prices in an already heated market. "We want to build our collector base, not the investor base," he says, with the sort of idyllic vision on which the art movement of Bengal was first raised.

While ECA, even though it has started with a Rs 50 crore budget in its first year, expects to take things slow and easy "" its two other auctions planned for this year are on modern artists, and sculpture and collectible art ("like postcards," says Bachhawat, "or wooden toys made by [M F] Husain").

Triveda, on its part, has been silent, its website not updated on the results even of its second auction many months ago. Apparao, like ECA, seems to be rooting for artists from the east and the south. And Bid & Hammer, though offering a mixed melange, is simultaneously linking art with collectibles, accessories and the innards of house sales.

While Bangalore may not have the advantage of Kolkata's tax rebate, it has, according to Dadha, "the third biggest art buying market after Delhi and Mumbai, and can be a catchment area for Chennai, Hyderabad, Kochi and Coimbatore, together a large chunk of wealthy HNIs".

Bid & Hammer is already exploring the possibility of doing sales not just in New Delhi and Mumbai, but also in New York, London, Dubai and Hong Kong "" this last because it may be exploring options to work with a Europe-based auction house.

It may seem like an awful lot of art on offer, but the gavel coming down frequently in the time of art funds, could be a signal of competitive pricing for art buyers "" a welcome change after the recent galloping prices.

A LARGE NUMBER OF AUCTIONS LAUNCH THE SEASON FOR 2008.

Osian's
Its 100 years of modern and contemporary art on January 19 saw prices spiralling again after some market correction. Works by J Swaminathan and S H Raza commanded Rs 3.1 crore each, Tyeb Mehta Rs 2.6 crore, M F Husain Rs 2.2 crore, F N Souza Rs 2.1 crore and Ram-kumar Rs 1.2 crore. The sale, part of which consisted of the collections of Mukund and Neerja Lath, and Suhridchandra Sinha, grossed a total of Rs 32 crore (including 20 per cent buyer's premium but not the taxes).

Bid & Hammer
The Bangalore-based auction house debuted this week with a mixed bag of modern and contemporary Indian paintings, even including an early S H Raza. At the time of going to press, we learn from promoter M Maher Dadha that Bangalore warmed up to artists who were inexpensive and the collectibles, but also sold Husain, Raza and Jamini Roy, though there were some timing hiccups. But then, his aim is also to promote unknowns, such as R Raja "who is very good", he said.

Apparao
Online from February 28 to March 2, the Chennai-based gallery will plug the gap in sculptors from the south. The pick of the lot, need one say, is a resin head by Ravinder Reddy, who is already the highest grossing sculptor in the country.

Emami Chisel Art
Also debuting with its first show next month (February 23) in Kolkata, at a physical-cum-online auction of Indian modern and contemporary art, at what director Vikram Bachhawat touts as the most competitive prices on the auction circuit, he asks: "When was the last time you saw Souza from the '50s (Rs 1.5-2 crore), Tyeb Mehta (Rs 4-5 crore), Amrita Sher-Gil (Rs 12-16 lakh for charcoals), Husain's 'Safdar Hashmi' (Rs 2-2.5 crore), Bikash Bhattacharjee (Rs 40-50 lakh), Ganesh Pyne (Rs 12-16 lakh), Manjit Bawa (Rs 40-50 lakh) and Swaminathan (Rs 80 lakh-1 crore) together in an auction?" Point taken.