At a recent preview of Bowrings? forthcoming auction of jewellery and other objects, a friend confided in me how duplicate works of a leading artist surfaced recently. And when seen by the artist, they were all rejected as fakes.
They may well have been; but I do think artists as the primary producers of objects have a responsibility to ensure authenticity and confidence in marketing them.
They can at least maintain a record of each work, its size, medium and subject matter. In fact, some of our more serious artists keep such a record but the majority do not.
Those who do will find it easier to market their works as the buyer will not have to go from pillar to post to prove authenticity. It would be better if artists were to give notes of authenticity with every work gifted or sold so that anyone buying in the secondary market will have a documentary proof of authenticity which ought to be beyond question.
This would help the artist as well. In fact, artists who document their works, like MF Husain, get far higher prices then those who did not care, like Jamini Roy.
Another element that the artist must concern himself or herself with is the quality of work. There is a tendency today for artists to see themselves as architects or overseers of works, which are executed, as a team.
There is nothing wrong with that intrinsically. But it must be acknowledged by the artist concerned.
For example, artists like Vivan Sundaram, who use craftsmen to help in installations or other assistance, regularly give credit for that to the craftspersons concerned. The same is true for Arpana Caur who, in collaborative works, regularly asks the collaborator to co-sign the work with her. This transparency is necessary.
There are two reasons for it. Technical assistance is often necessary to get the ?donkey work? done on large projects purely from the angle of the time consumed. This is permissible. Another aspect is the emergence of the team of collaborators in a series of works, who evolve together. This too is permissible if proper credit is given by the artist.
What is not permissible is for an artist to just be a brand name and get the work done by someone else. In such cases, the assistant may project a small drawing on a large canvas with a projector and do the work himself, to be signed by the artist only.
In all honesty, such works ought to be labelled as ?attributed to? or ?produced in the atelier of? in auctions and be priced accordingly. Generally, once an artist is known to be regularly producing work with this kind of assistance, the price of his or her work falls accordingly. If it does not on the basis of lack of information, then it is a form of fraud.
In the market, it is well-known that sculptures are made with considerable assistance from the craftpersons. So they are generally less highly priced than canvases which are expected to be the finished work of an artist after a series of sketches and drawings are complete, as is the case with any of the temperas of Ganesh Pyne. That is why they command the prices they do. Even the use of technique by an accomplished artist has an originality that a craftsperson working to order does not have. If he or she does have that quality, then they ought to be regarded as artists in their own right and command prices accordingly.
This is the case with a number of our folk artists who were presented as such by the Crafts Museum in Delhi. Their works show an originality that is undeniable. They are artists who have evolved out of their experience as crafts persons, but have gone beyond it. They are not producing works to order, but expressing themselves with all the freedom artists have.
Finally, contemporary artists have the responsibility of keeping up with the times. Visionaries will do better, but then not everyone has it in himself or herself to be a visionary. One should be aware of one?s responsibilities to one?s work, the honesty of expression, its contemaporaneity and originality.
Being a brand name, gimmickry or just plain good market relations can temporarily hold prices up, but they seldom make for good investment in art.
That requires quality, honesty, vision and a sense of responsibility to the future. The art market expects that from artists as much as from gallery owners, dealers and auctioneers.