India’s art market is estimated to have been at around Rs14.6 billion (Rs1,460 crore) in 2017, a decline of 6% from the previous year as demonetisation and introduction of the Goods and Services Tax adversely affected growth in the industry, a FICCI-KPMG report says.

The report, titled ‘Visual Arts Industry: Painting the future’, talks about the art industry and highlights major trends, key drivers and challenges faced by the visual arts industry.

While the scrapping of high-value currency notes in November 2016 had an adverse impact on sales of art galleries, which also deal in sales of affordable art, challenges in the implementation of GST impacted sales of auction houses, with many holding at least one less sale during the year, according to the report.

Under the new taxation structure, artworks, including paintings, drawings and pastels, original engravings, prints and lithographs, original sculptures and statuary in any material and antiquities older than 100 years, fall under the 12% tax bracket, making them more expensive than previously, especially in West Bengal where artworks were earlier exempted from VAT.

A significant proportion of the art market belongs to the Rs 0.1-0.5 million segment and a tax rate of 12% on this is substantial enough to discourage buyers.

“Growth in art and cultural initiatives is helping lay a strong foundation, positioning India as one of the major art destinations. However, the industry continues to grapple with challenges regarding infrastructure, taxation and lack of awareness about art. With joint support from both private players and government bodies, the industry is likely to embark on a remarkable growth trajectory,” said Girish Menon, co-head — media and entertainment, KPMG India.

Although the Indian visual arts industry has been dominated by art galleries, auction houses are slowly increasing their share in the overall market pie. Of the total visual arts market size in 2017, the share of art galleries stood at 64% compared with 36% for auction houses.

Major auction houses in India are: Saffronart with a 26.6% market share, followed by Christie’s (21.1%), AstaGuru (18%), Sotheby’s (13.2%), Pundole’s (9.2%), and others (12%). Although Christie’s may have withdrawn from the live auctions in the country, it still maintains its leading position through online auctions.

There has been a radical decline in the value of contemporary works sold since 2013, the report said. In the period of January to September 2017, 183 works of Indian contemporary art were sold in auctions around the world, fetching a total of Rs 126.3 million. This was a sharp decline from the 333 artworks sold for Rs 399 million during the same period in 2013.

Factors contributing to the decline include a lack of institutional support, an artificial rise in art prices from a decade ago and collectors and galleries from Europe leaning in favour of contemporary art from other regions such as Africa, the FICCI-KPMG report says.

However, the report said the Indian art industry is likely to see contemporary art sales picking up, supported by a diversified buyer base mostly in the age groups of 30s and 40s. This trend will be further supported by an increase in online art sales with a number of players offering curated, branded online auctions across an assortment of art and collectibles.

Some of the key challenges in the Indian industry include lack of infrastructure, skilled manpower, forged art and a lack of art awareness. The Indian art industry also needs a specialised association of visual arts professionals who can engage directly with the policymakers.

The report recommended that involvement of corporates and the private sector could help the industry in raising funds, organising art festivals and events, and promoting budding artists.

Apart from this, government support, particularly through funding, infrastructure, creating awareness and rationalising the tax structure would build a solid ground for the industry to flourish.

First Published: Sat, Feb 17 2018. 01 27 AM IST
Credit – Saumya Tewari
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How do you go about choosing just one artist in 2009 who continued doing what an artist does best: painting with consistency, experimenting, picking up commissions of a certain scale, and commanding top-of-the-bracket prices in that genre? And who would most likely take this forward in 2010 as the face of Indian art and as, probably, its safest blue-chip investment?

Trends across 2009 were mostly erratic. Even top artists took a sabbatical, gallery movement before the India Art Summit was almost comatose, plummeting prices meant that most contemporary artists went out of circulation, and investor confidence in art was so low it impacted artists’ morale. It is indicative of contemporary art continuing to remain off-stage in 2010: these artists will show more than they sell, they will experiment more, and some like Jitish Kallat will have a huge impact as ambassadors as they present the intellectual face of Indian art internationally.

But no contemporary Indian artist can singly take on the onus of being the face of 2010 — they are showing less, prices still have to rise, and what many of us are getting to see at shows in India or abroad are old works. Others have still to achieve a record of consistency — something that had been ignored in the euphoria that was largely responsible for the crash in prices — and which is why the likes of Sunil Gawde or N S Harsha will have to wait for their spot in the sun.

Among the old guard, gallerists I spoke with put forward interesting suggestions ranging all the way from A Ramachandran to Krishen Khanna, whose works I admire but who have not had any path-breaking shows or created an especial stir to qualify for the role, to Satish Gujral, who it was pointed out has perhaps been India’s most consistent artist and one whose prices have not been impacted by the market. While that may be true, his largely “decorative” features and tag as a “society” artist continue to trip him up. Another friend’s suggestion that Paresh Maity be considered for his ability to re-invent himself held some merit, but Maity too has to fight off the “romantic” tag and travel some more distance to move from “investment-worthy” to “collector-worthy”.

It was surprising that almost no one I spoke to took cognizance of S H Raza’s great influence on the market — there is a frenzy around collecting him, his prices have remained high, there is a buzz around him every time he returns to India (even if the reason is the artist being invited to inaugurate a show of fakes of his own works!), and at auctions or in galleries, he continues to sell well. But the artist is slowing down because of health-related issues, likely to shift to India, and may take some time settling down before he resumes painting again. That hardly qualifies him as the face of 2010, though his success through the year is at least assured.

But by a huge margin, and quite clearly the face of 2009 that will remain the face of 2010, is M F Husain. There was a brief time a few years ago when Husain’s genius was eclipsed, when younger artists were being feted, when some of his peers commanded higher returns at auctions, when he was even dismissed as being too gimmicky or too market-driven. All those nay-sayers can now eat crow. Not only does he make news all the time, and despite staying away from India because of threats to his life (largely exaggerated, I believe, but adding to his aura as an artist-in-exile), Husain continues to thrive.

Recent auctions have confirmed his price hierarchy among Indian artists (Tyeb Mehta, who died this year, has not been included in this survey of only living artists), and the scale of his commissions on the Arab civilisation will leave him richer by millions of dollars. Love him or not, you cannot ignore Husain, and if he remained in the news in 2009, he will continue to make headlines in 2010.

While many in this informal survey voted for Husain, Saffronart’s Dinesh Vazirani summed it up beautifully: “[Husain] has been working consistently throughout the year, mounting some very large exhibitions internationally. The beginning of the year saw his work in the Serpentine show, followed by a large commission from the Sheikha of Qatar. Even with no exhibitions in India, he is still present in the minds of the art world. He travels the world as an ambassador of Indian art bringing in new collectors at every stage. In spite of the slow year for Indian art, his prices in auctions have been good. He has taken his exile from India in the best possible spirit and continues to work with the same passion that he has had over the last 50 years.” Nothing more need be said.

Source – http://www.business-standard.com
Kishore Singh / New Delhi December 30, 2009

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HONG KONG (Reuters) – Down a quiet Hong Kong lane beside the century-old masonry of a colonial-era prison, the 10 Chancery Lane Gallery is abuzz as staff hang bright, bold canvasses and hand-painted photos by three female Indian artists.

The past few years have been golden for hundreds of such modish art galleries and antiques dealers dotted about Hong Kong island’s jumbled streets, swept along by the Asian art craze and its hip allure with buyers in the region and beyond.

Glitzy art fairs sprang up across Asia, from Shanghai to Tokyo, while records tumbled for contemporary artists such as India’s Subodh Gupta, China’s Zeng Fanzhi and Indonesia’s I Nyoman Masriadi.But now with the financial gloom, many galleries are bracing for a painful slump as the disposable income of the city’s bankers, businessmen and middle-class professionals shrink.

“We haven’t seen any downturn in our business but we are seeing it in the auctions, and we expect it to happen,” said Katie de Tilly, the owner of the 10 Chancery Lane gallery which will halve its number of shows this year given the bleak outlook.
“If you are investing in art, have your eyes open, very open right now because I can see things coming down in a big way.”

CRACKS
While some galleries with their patient stabling of loyal artists and diversified client base have yet to be badly burned, the high-profile art auction market is showing serious strain for both Western and Asian art.

Sotheby’s auction of Impressionist and modern art in New York earlier this week fell far short of the $338 million to $475 million that had been expected, as buyers swooped for rare masterpieces but stayed away from lesser works that were generally seen as unrealistically overpriced.

At Sotheby’s autumn Asian sales in Hong Kong, seen as a key biannual barometer of market sentiment, the firm only managed to hammer off around half its expected total, with auction rooms stricken by large numbers of unsold lots.Sotheby’s weak showing seemed to mark a symbolic turning point for the seemingly unstoppable Chinese art market, which has skyrocketed these past four years, particularly the works of star artists such as Zhang Xiaogang, Yue Minjun and Cai Guoqiang.

Some experts say the less established reputations of Asian artists versus timeworn western masters make major record-breaking results unlikely at the current time, but their much cheaper valuations make such artists attractive for buyers seeking long run returns.
Chinese art website Artron.net showed a 14 percent fall in its Chinese contemporary art index this autumn compared with the spring, while its benchmark index of 400 top Chinese artists showed a 28 percent decline for the same period.

Much attention is now focused on the next major auction of Asian art by Christie’s in late November, with the auction house moderating its usual bullish optimism with a more prudent line.

“It’s a volatile period, pricing is going to fluctuate and we really need to be careful about estimates,” said Andy Foster, Christie’s Asia President.

“And we need to encourage sellers to agree to reasonable estimates and also to be generous to allow buyers to pay, extra time if possible,” he added.

Others however go further.

Mei Jianping, a academic who created the Fine Art index, a widely cited measure of mostly Western art market performance, said the contemporary art market could plunge by 50 percent.

“There was a bubble worldwide, not just in Chinese contemporary art, but western contemporary art as well … but now, the air has been really sucked out, so you’ll see a significant cooling down of the market,” Mei told Reuters.

POSITIVE
Yet for some gallery owners, the headwinds in Chinese and Western art are being seen as a blessing in disguise.

“I always try and be positive,” said Nicole Schoeni, owner of the pioneering Schoeni gallery, one of the first in Hong Kong to promote contemporary Chinese artists such as Yue Minjun in the 90’s.

“People are starting to come back down to earth, whether it’s the speculative collectors or the artists themselves, and I think ultimately it needed a correction of some sort,” she added.
The Opera Gallery group which runs a global chain of galleries in Europe, Asia and the U.S. isn’t deterred by the downturn and will expand to fresh sites in Dubai and Geneva.
“As we specialize in a range of art from old masters like Picasso and Chagall to rising artists from Europe, Asia and America, we are not as susceptible to economic volatility,” said Stephane Le Pelletier, its Asia Pacific director in Singapore.

For Bangalore-based video artist Surekha whose works delve into Indian identity and womanhood, the art boom has brought perks including her biggest single pay-check of $27,000 for a work sold at a 2005 Sotheby’s auction.

While she says some Indian artists have been pressured by the market spotlight, the downturn for her irrelevant.

“We know the no-money days and the money days,” the diminutive and bubbly 42-year-old said with a laugh.

“We can still make work, so it doesn’t really matter.”

(Additional reporting by Melanie Lee in Singapore; editing by Megan goldin)

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The Indian art market is reaching new heights. Pavan Kapoor visits the subcontinent to find out what is fueling the boom.
Indian art has formally arrived in its role as a financial asset. This is apparent as I walk into the pulsating Habitat Center, the 5000 sq feet complex in New Delhi which has become the center of contemporary cultural, economic, business and social events since the last decade.
Artists have become brand names, coveted and consumed with the same zeal as the newly rich snap up Chanel and Jimmy Choo. The galleries mushrooming in Mumbai and Delhi are as swank as anything you’ll see in New York or London — exhibitions open to the clink of champagne glasses, with delectable hors d’oeuvres and loads of press.
The boom in Asian/Chinese art can be denoted to foreign buyers but that of India is surprisingly coming from Indians, or people of Indian descent, who are the main players in their own art scene. It started with non-resident Indians or NRIs who were initially nostalgic about Indian art but then began to recognize its potential as an investment.
Rajiv Chaudhri, a New York-based Indian hedge-fund manager, set off ripples in the art world in late 2005 by paying US$1.6m for a Mehta work. The amount paid for the Mahishasura, depicting the buffalo-demon of Hindu mythology, was a milestone as the first contemporary Indian painting to cross the million-dollar mark. Other significant NRI collectors include New Jersey-based Umesh and Sunanda Gaur, Kent Chitlangia and new age guru Deepak Chopra.
Officials from Sotheby’s who were in Mumbai for a road show [WHEN?] for auctions of Indian art in London and New York confirmed the company’s sales of Indian art enhanced over US$375 million in 2007, compared to $62 million in 2004.
India has seen an unprecedented growth in the art market since 2005.. The upward spiraling prices made the whole world turn around and look at Indian painters in a fresh light. Today the Indian art market is worth US$350 million, which is only 1 percent of the world art market. But with rising disposable incomes and current economic situation the Indian contemporary art market in the coming years will drive both prices and growth.
The market’s future potential also lies in the burgeoning disposable income of the middle class coupled with unprecedented awareness and access to art information.
Artist Atul Dodiya is feted at galleries in New York and London where his paintings sell for six-figure sums. But it’s in Mumbai where he chooses to create art reflecting the tumultuous changes in his homeland. Dodiya is riding a wave of success. His Three Painters sold for US$541000, more than triple its pre-sale estimate, at a Christie’s auction in New York last year. The sale confirmed Dodiya’s reputation as a leader of a generation of contemporary Indian artists whose canvases are filled with the colors of a country on the boil,
Structuring the boom back home is the massive initiative taken on by the pharmaceutical mogul, Ranbaxy. The Religare Arts Initiative is a 360 degree point of view, an effort to bring art closer to people and to reach out to lovers and patrons of art the world over. It will have various initiatives and outreach programs planned in conjunction with art institutions, museums, galleries and curators. The collaborations with such esteemed institutions/individuals will help in enriching public awareness about art, with the hope that art will become an inherent part of their lives. It is a holistic approach for the growth, development and business of art.
“The Religare Arts Initiative will ensure that all the diverse dimensions of art are nurtured and given the right exposure, so that art assumes a greater role in societal fabric and enriches a wider consciousness, at the same time become a positive driver for wealth generation in a free market economy,” said Sunil Godhwani, the CEO of Religare Enterprises Ltd.
Dr Alka Pande, probably the most respected authority in the India art scene today. Is the Consultant Arts Advisor and Curator, Visual Arts Gallery, India Habitat Centre, has been responsible for curating some of Delhi’s most unusual and perceptive shows in recent times. She also is the official curator on the board of Religare Arts Initiative and has authored several books on art and art history, and has a special interest in ancient Indian erotic literature and art .
Mr. Mukesh Panika heads the Arts Initiative at Religare. He has been the master mind for this Initiative and has been working hard on putting together its various aspects to establish a transparent and functional institution that is a genuine benchmark for artists, investers and art lovers of a wide spectrum.
“The Religare Art Initiative has recently taken over a 10,000 square feet space in Connaught Place, the heart of New Delhi and plans on opening the biggest gallery in India, a café, a resource center,” says Mukesh. “With art taken as such a serious financial asset today it can only grow if the infrastructure is strong and that is when a strong corporate group comes in at that platform,” he continues.
It is indeed a serious job at hand for Religare when we hear of ground-breaking news of the painting Tribute to Hashmi, MF Husain India’s icon of painter broke the US$1 million record. In a historic moment at the Emami Chisel Art Auction in Kolkota. Among some highlights of the evening were Tyeb Mehta’s Kali III which fetched a little over US$1 million and J.Swaminathan’s Bird & Mountain which fetched almost US$4 million.
Besides works of Husain and Mehta, pioneering painters F N Souza and J Swaminathan also fetched over US$250,000 for their paintings.Souza’s Manor House, whose reserve price was fixed at US$1 million, was sold for US $412,500. Amrita Shergill’s two untitled charcoal paintings were sold for about US$55,000 and US$37,000 while S H Raza’s ‘Landscape’ cost US$230,000 for a bidder.
At the Sothebys auction in Feb 2008, speculators who swooped on the Chinese market have moved in on the Indian art scene and are now eyeing artists from the subcontinent such as Jitish Kallat and Subodh Gupta and so many others.
Heady days these might be but the rapid commercialization of the art scene has prompted some soul-searching.
“Being an artist is not what it used to be,” confesses a member of the art frat. “It has become about churning out work and making money.” Amid the dross lurk the gems – canvasses filled with the colours of an India on the move, an India grappling with complex issues like the cost of rapid development, societal tensions and the growing gap between rich and poor.

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