Over the last few months, India has undoubtedly become a star performer on the art markets. The country’s excellent economic performance, the constantly rising reputation of its artists and the boom in private collecting have made the Indian market one of the most promising environments for contemporary art in the twenty-first century.
The dynamic gallery scene in India, is backed up by the high prices that Indian artists works are able to command at international fairs and on the secondary market. Auction houses such as Sotheby’s and Christie’s have achieved record sales and devote an increasing amount of time on their programmes to monographic sessions on Indian modern and contemporary art. One clear example is provided by the record figures fetched by works produced by Subodh Gupta (Khagoul/Bihar, 1964), whose installation entitled “Vehicle for the Seven Seas” was sold at the French auction house, Artcurial, last April for 425,000 euros, more than tripling the initial estimate. However, this record figure only lasted a few months, because it was soon surpassed in May by a work produced by Saat Samundar Paar which was sold in Hong Kong in May for 651,000 euros. Finally, last 16th September, Christie’s in New York went beyond the psychological barrier of one million dollars with the sculpture Milter, 2007, which was sold for 1,022,500 dollars (698,600 euros).
Along the same lines, the autumn session staged in September by the leading auction house in India, Saffronart, established a series of record sales for 18 Indian artists, including the following: Anju Dodiya, Anita Dube, Sudarshan Shetty, Manisha Parekh, Kishor Shinde, Chitra Ganesh and Nicola Durvasula. According to the daily newspaper, The Economic Times, collectors from a total of 32 countries took part in this auction, whilst the works that were purchased achieved a price that was 72% above their initial estimate on average. These anecdotes are just a few examples of how Indian artists are enjoying growing levels of success and arousing an enormous degree of interest among collectors, including both Indian and international buyers.
The extraordinary boom being enjoyed in India, which falls within the general framework of a strongly performing Asian market, is one of the most outstanding development on the up-and-coming art scene. Thus, in July 2008, the market valuation index produced by the prestigious French consultants, Artprice, presented an overall growth figure of +3,23% over the last ten years within the “Indian Contemporary Art” segment. This growth is destined to continue and places Indian artists clearly in the sight of collectors and investors.
Within this context, India’s international art fair- India Art Summit™ will make every effort to ensure that both India and its contemporary art scene gain the highest levels of visibility, offering an insight into the rich appeal and diversity of the Indian market to the visitors from Asia, the Middle East, Europe & Americas.
