There is a lot in the newspapers about a copy of Picasso?s catalogue of an exhibition of the drawings he did for his seminal work ?Guernica,? which definitely qualifies as the painting of the 20th century. The catalogue is expected to fetch over Rs 7 lakh. It is definitely a work worth buying for any bibliophile.
For the collectors of contemporary art too, it would be an important acquisition, largely because ?Guernica,? painted in 1937, is an important link in the chain that established our contemporary artistic expression as a global one. Its significance lay in the fact that while it does not represent the early breaks from imperial academic, theatrical or sentimental art that artists like Matisse, Van Gogh, Klee, Mondrian, the Bauhaus artists working under Gropius, the Dadaists like Duchamp and Kanbara Tai, or the print makers inspired by Lu Hsun or those inspired by Rabindranath Tagore and his relatives Gaganendranath and Abanindranath, or Jamini Roy, broke away from. It represents a challenge to fascism that was the most serious enemy our contemporary art has had to face in all its existence.
Fascism put an end to the Bauhaus that drew considerable inspiration from the ideal of the East as communicated by the Theosophists. Hitler closed down the school in 1933. Other leading contemporary artists like Georg Grosz were forced into exile. In Tojo?s Japan, contemporary art was also under attack by the fascist regime. Ichiro Fukazawa and other artists were arrested and jailed for years. Picasso himself was under attack from Franco in Spain and had to leave his country and live in France. But artists continued to challenge fascism consistently, and ?Guernica? is the world?s most famous example of such a challenge. Needless to say, fascism lost not only the battle of ideas but also World War II, as a result of which contemporary art as we know it today has come to stay. But the attacks launched against contemporary artists by fascists continue, as we can see from the way our leading artist MF Husain has been repeatedly attacked by the Sangh Parivar and the Shiv Sena.
In India, the anti-fascist trend in art was more anti-colonial than being anti the axis power, although artists like Chitta Prasad did do important series of works to highlight the People?s War that was being fought against Hitler. In fact, the ambivalent figure of Subhash Chandra Bose riding a horse to victory in Manipur is the fanciful subject of powerful, but small paintings of Ram Kinkar Baij, reminding us that the art history of different countries is a good deal more independent than their economies in a globalising situation. A good investor must learn to respect this difference if he does not want to be taken for a ride.
A survey of works of our contemporary art that sold for twice the highest price expected of them at the Christie?s and Sotheby?s sales of September 23 and 24 last year in New York would serve as good mirror for the investor in contemporary Indian art. MF Husain clearly stands head and shoulders above the others, with four works selling at over twice the price expected and an average rate of Rs 687.76 per square cm. While this is the price of his best work, others ought to be available in the range of Rs 223.50 per sq cm to Rs 450 per sq cm.
The next on the list was J Swaminathan with an average of Rs 426.29 per sq cm. Other works can be had at prices that range from Rs 146 per sq cm to Rs 200 per sq cm. SH Raza had only work that sold at above twice the price expected. It sold at Rs 297 per sq cm. The average price of Raza?s works ranges between Rs 150 per sq cm to Rs 300 per sq cm. FN Souza was also among these with an average of over Rs 300 per sq cm. Works of his can be bought at between Rs 200 per sq cm and Rs 280 per sq cm. B Prabha had two works selling at over twice the price expected, with an average of Rs 381.81 per sq cm. Otherwise, her works can be bought on average between Rs 149 per sq cm to Rs 280 per sq cm. Ram Kumar too was among these artists, selling at a price of Rs 277.50 per sq cm. On average, one can expect to buy his works at between Rs 138 per sq cm to Rs 240 per sq cm.
Atul Dodiya fetched no less than Rs 144.64 per sq cm. On average one can expect to get his work at between Rs 78 per sq cm to Rs 115 per sq cm depending on the quality of the work. Other artists who figured in the list were George Keyt at Rs 115.23 per sq cm, Rajendra Dhawan at Rs 41.73 per sq cm and Paritosh Sen at Rs 36.18 per sq cm. However, the list has only value in assessing which artists are creating interest among buyers at present as there are artists like Ganesh Pyne and Jamini Roy, whose prices have been better assessed by the auction houses so that they sold above those, but not so far above them as to be over double the price expected.
Husain continues to surprise one with the buoyancy of his prices, while Souza and Raza, like Pyne, appear to have stabilised. Good works of J Swaminathan, B Prabha and Ram Kumar to appear to be of interest at least to some well-organised forces that wish to promote them. And the new faces that are emerging seem to be those of Rajendra Dhawan, Atul Dodiya and Paritosh Sen for different reasons.
The picture that emerges is that the art that distinguished itself from that of India?s colonial tastes still remains the dominant trend, while those who evolved within its framework towards the new postwar anti-fascist art and experimented with abstraction, consumer culture or a refined radical tinge to the realities of our changing times are still the best investments in our art even as far a field as New York today. And they are likely to remain so for some time to come.