India’s biggest art fair opened on Friday, pulling in dozens of foreign galleries seeking to tap a new breed of buyers in one of the world’s fastest-growing economies.
Now in its third edition, the annual Indian Art Summit has expanded sharply in both size and prominence, with 84 galleries taking part this year compared with 55 last time.
As well as offering rare global exposure for Indian artists, it also provides an exploratory platform for overseas dealers who feel India’s booming economy is minting a sizeable pool of wealthy buyers interested in international art.
Photo: AFP
The number of participating foreign galleries has doubled from last year to 34, with exhibitors from France, Germany, Canada, the US, Singapore and Japan.
“From the start, our objective was to create a window into the Indian art market,” the event’s director Neha Kirpal said. “We wanted to facilitate the growth of Indian art and its market within India, and to create a consolidated platform of Indian art for the world outside.”
The lack of both a vibrant museum culture and private funding for art events means public awareness, particularly of contemporary art, is still very much in its infancy in India.
However, overseas interest, following a general slump in prices in 2009, is regaining momentum — albeit with a strong focus on well-established artists.
Last year, a 1983 painting, Saurashtra, by Syed Haider Raza, sold for about ￡2.4 million (US$3.8 million) at Christie’s in London, setting a record for a modern Indian work.
“Serious collectors are there and this is backed with -confidence in the Indian -economy and with people investing as a hedge against inflation,” said Dinesh Vazirani, owner of online auctioneer Saffronart.
For many years, conventional wisdom had it that Indian collectors only bought Indian art, and the vast majority of the 500 artists whose works are being shown at the New Delhi event are either Indian or of Indian origin.
However, a number of foreign galleries, like the Frankfurt-based Die Galerie, believe there is an increasing desire among Indian buyers for foreign work.
“People here are eager, hungry and interested,” said the gallery’s owner Peter Femfert, whose booth boasted a number of pieces by the likes of Pablo Picasso, Joan Miro and Salvador Dali.
“You can’t just sit in your gallery and count dead flies in the window. You have to go out and find the customers,” said Femfert, a first time participant in the Delhi event.
“There are a few large Indian collectors of international art who have been buying abroad. It’s time for the sellers to come to India and offer something in this country,” he said.
While the works offered by Femfert carry the recognition value that might appeal to wealthy individuals looking for an investment — or the bragging rights that go with a Picasso in the living room — other gallery owners believe there is also a market in India for new, less established artists.
“It may still be early, but in the next five years I think we’re going to see a shift, with Indian buyers looking outside India,” said Paul Greenaway of the Greenaway Art Gallery in Australia.
“I’ll be really disappointed if all those second-string Picassos and Miros are the works that get sold. I hope there are discerning buyers here who will look beyond that stuff for some new, interesting works,” Greenaway said.
At the last Indian Art Summit in 2009, held during a cooling market, more than half the works on display were sold for a total of US$5.4 million — an impressive sum that fueled Kirpal’s ambitions for putting the event on a par with established contemporary art fairs.
It also impressed Genevieve Levesque of the Ottawa-based Arteria Gallery, a first-time participant who admitted she had no idea what sort of response to expect to the works of the young Canadian artists she had brought along.
“It’s a shot in the dark really, but a calculated one,” she said. “We feel there’s a slice of the cake available for everybody and that includes a rising demand for good, affordable art.”
DOLLAR CHALLENGE: BRICS countries’ growing share of global GDP threatens the US dollar’s dominance, which some member states seek to displace for world trade US president-elect Donald Trump on Saturday threatened 100 percent tariffs against a bloc of nine nations if they act to undermine the US dollar. His threat was directed at countries in the so-called BRICS alliance, which consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates. Turkey, Azerbaijan and Malaysia have applied to become members and several other countries have expressed interest in joining. While the US dollar is by far the most-used currency in global business and has survived past challenges to its preeminence, members of the alliance and other developing nations say they are fed
LIMITED MEASURES: The proposed restrictions on Chinese chip exports are weaker than previously considered, following lobbying by major US firms, sources said US President Joe Biden’s administration is weighing additional curbs on sales of semiconductor equipment and artificial intelligence (AI) memory chips to China that would escalate the US crackdown on Beijing’s tech ambitions, but stop short of some stricter measures previously considered, said sources familiar with the matter. The restrictions could be unveiled as soon as next week, said the sources, who emphasized that the timing and contours of the rules have changed several times, and that nothing is final until they are published. The measures follow months of deliberations by US officials, negotiations with allies in Japan and the Netherlands, and
Qualcomm Inc’s interest in pursuing an acquisition of Intel Corp has cooled, people familiar with the matter said, upending what would have likely been one of the largest technology deals of all time. The complexities associated with acquiring all of Intel has made a deal less attractive to Qualcomm, said some of the people, asking not to be identified discussing confidential matters. It is always possible Qualcomm looks at pieces of Intel instead or rekindles its interest later, they added. Representatives for Qualcomm and Intel declined to comment. Qualcomm made a preliminary approach to Intel on a possible takeover, Bloomberg News and other media
Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團) yesterday said it expects any impact of new tariffs from US president-elect Donald Trump to hit the company less than its rivals, citing its global manufacturing footprint. Young Liu (劉揚偉), chairman of the contract manufacturer and key Apple Inc supplier, told reporters after a forum in Taipei that it saw the primary impact of any fresh tariffs falling on its clients because its business model is based on contract manufacturing. “Clients may decide to shift production locations, but looking at Foxconn’s global footprint, we are ahead. As a result, the impact on us is likely smaller compared to
RSS