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Press about M.F.Husain
http://www.artinfo.com/news/story/846892/the-late-mf-husain-already-an-icon-of-indian-art-becomes-a
The Late M.F. Husain, Already an Icon of Indian Art,
Becomes a Market Darling
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Courtesy Saffronart. M.F. Husain's "Civilisation," 1991, acrylic on canvas, sold for $804,535 at Saffronart in 2006 |
Over the course of Maqbool Fida Husain’s more than five-decade career, the prolific artist gained international renown for his skill at blending a bold modernism with historical subject matter and Indian iconography. At the time of his death at age 95 in June 2011, he was celebrated not only as an artist who continued to work at the peak of his powers into his 80s, but also as a glamorous man who lived his long life to the fullest. Most often, he was pictured with his signature snowy white beard and hair, dressed in elegant yet laid-back clothes, tinted glasses perched on his aquiline nose, and a deeply satisfied grin on his face.
His output was so prodigious that even now, experts have trouble coming up with an estimate of the number of works he created. “I would not be able to put a number to his canvases,” says Projjal Dutta, a partner at Aicon Gallery, which has long represented Husain in both New York and London. “But I’d see him do two paintings in the course of a day,” he adds.
Although he embraced varied styles and themes, Husain’s striking, often oversize canvases that blend jewel-like colors with Cubistic figurative forms drawn from classical Indian art and religion have consistently attracted the most attention in the market. Battle of Ganga and Jamuna: Mahabharata 12, 1971–72, captured the auction record in March 2008, when it earned $1.6 million at Christie’s South Asian modern and contemporary art sale in New York, doubling the previous record of $804,535 set in 2006 at auctioneer Saffronart for Civilisation, 1991. Battle of Ganga and Jamuna, a six-foot-wide, oil-on-canvas diptych, features abstracted figures that recall those of classical Hindu sculptures, rendered in blocks of color.
“As collectors continue to look for important works by Husain from specific periods, that come with airtight provenance, the demand for these has seen an increase over the last few years,” says Dinesh Vazirani, the co-founder of Saffronart, an online auction house that specializes in Indian art.
Though his record came at the peak of the modern and contemporary Indian art market, prices remain strong. “Since his passing, Husain’s market has broadened and demand has increased,” says Arun Vadehra, director of Vadehra Art Gallery, in New Delhi, which has represented the artist for nearly two decades.
Husain’s productivity, lengthy career, and solid sales track record provides a well-defined, transparent market, experts say, with Dutta confirming that private, or gallery, sale prices mirror ranges in the auction realm. “Our prices fall in line with auction prices, as most of our clients refer to auction estimates and sales to guide their purchases, thus regulating the trajectory of artwork valuations. There truly is very little difference between the auction value and our pricing,” Dutta says.
A number of galleries played a critical role in his life, including the Pundole and Chemould Galleries, in Mumbai, and the Kumar Gallery, in New Delhi. Vadehra Art Gallery in India and Aicon in New York became more important to Husain during the later years of his career and they continue to dominate his market today.
The artist’s varied works display an intellectual’s attempt to synthesize themes and a dexterity with diverse iconographies synonymous with India and its multifaceted culture, both ancient and contemporary. Beyond images of Hindu deities, Husain is also known for his ongoing bodies of work featuring horses (a reference to a theme in Shia Muslim imagery as well as the Hindu god Surya, who drove a horse-drawn chariot) and a trio of iconic, yet very disparate, women: Buddha’s mother, Mahamaya; Mother Teresa; and Bollywood actress Madhuri Dixit.
Husain’s horse paintings, with their “tremendous lines and the majestic way that the horses hold their heads high,” as New York–based Priyanka Mathew, a Sotheby’s specialist in South Asian modern and contemporary art, describes them, are among his most expensive works and are highly sought-after by collectors.
Husain first extensively explored the theme of horses in the 1970s; the earlier and bigger these works are, experts say, the more they command on the market. “Works by Husain incorporating horses as subject matter can range from $50,000 to $1,000,000, depending on size and date,” Dutta says, with “a smaller work measuring roughly 14 by 36 inches at the lower price points.”
For example the $1,142,500 price, the second highest for Husain at auction, was achieved at Christie’s New York in September 2011 for Sprinkling Horses, from the 1970s, which measures 42 by 93 inches. Meanwhile, a smaller Untitled (Seven Horses), dated in the late ’70s or early ’80s, measuring 13 by 47 inches, sold for less than a tenth that price, $86,500, also at Christie’s New York this past March. And a much later oil of a horse made in 2011 sold for just $75,583 at Christie’s South Kensington in June of that year, weeks after the artist’s death. Dutta notes that he painted “often on popular demand, styles from a past period. So you have horses from the ’60s as well as from the ’90s. The former would usually command higher prices.”
Also popular in recent years are Husain’s works from the 1950s and ’60s that reflect his synthetic approach, says Mathew. “The earlier work garners the most interest, and much of it is already in collections, so it’s harder to get,” she says. Auction data show that these paintings from the 1950s, in which the artist’s style was heavily influenced by tribal art, generally sell for prices in the low six figures, but can reach up to the high six and low seven figures. In a March 2010 auction at Sotheby’s New York, an untitled Husain canvas originally shown in the 1956 Venice Biennale sold for $1.06 million, far higher than the estimate of $150,000 to $200,000.
