News related to Art Market

The art market: Indians in trouble by Georgina Adam

While Saatchi’s new show of Indian art, The Empire Strikes Back, is a talking point in London, the market for Indian art has taken some serious hits. At the height of the boom this was fever-hot, as speculators shifted from Chinese contemporary (which had become very expensive) into Indian
art. Prices soared and art funds mushroomed, led by Osian’s, India’s oldest art auction house. Its Rs100 crore (£13m) fund was launched in 2006; among those that followed was the Copal Art fund,
which sold investors art based on a price-per-square-foot. Between 2006
and 2008, according to the Indian business newspaper Livemint, some
Rs300 crore was invested in art.

But recently Indian artists have, in some cases, lost over 70 per cent of their value, and some funds are failing to deliver promised returns. Osian’s fund closed at
the end of last year, but not all investors have been paid; founder
Neville Tuli told the FT that they will be paid by February 24 and
admitted that the fund was “disappointing”. Osian’s is also mired in a
US-based lawsuit with Christie’s, which it accuses of failing to
deliver art it had bought; Menaka Kumari Shah, India representative of
the firm, said: “We have been seeking to recover a significant debt
from an Osian-related party for more than one year. Christie’s intends
to review all of its legal remedies in response to these baseless
allegations.”

The problem is not confined to art funds; Bodhi Art, one of India’s most flamboyant galleries, has become the highest-profile victim of the bust. At the height of its glory, the
gallery had outlets in Berlin, Singapore, New York, Mumbai and New
Delhi; now all are closed except Mumbai.