Eminent Indian painter Sayed Haider Raza’s painting Saurashtra is being auctioned in London next week and it is estimated to sell for £1.8 million.
Describing the 1983 painting by 87-year-old Raza as the most valuable modern Indian art work ever to be offered at any auction, Christie’s said the 200 x 200 cm painting is being offered on sale by a private French collector, who acquired it directly from the France-based artist.
Raza, who moved to France 60 years ago, lives in Paris and Corbio in southern France and last year decided to stop painting professionally.
Saurashtra, one of Madhya Pradesh-born Raza’s most ambitious works, provides a transitional bridge into his structured geometric works which are characteristic of his most recent body of paintings, said Christie’s auction house, which will sell the painting at its South Asian Modern and Contemporary Art Sale on June 10. The sale will be preceded by auction of art of another Indian great, Francis Newton Souza, on June 9.
The South Asia auction focuses on the Progressive Artists Group, with works of Tyeb Mehta, M.F. Husain and Bhupen Khakar being other highlights on sale.
Husain’s Untitled (Arjuna and Krishna), portraying the Mahabharata, is estimated to sell for £500,000-700,000.
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Monet may break UK sales record
London: Auction house Christie’s is offering a Monet water-lily painting worth an estimated £30 to 40 million in June in what it expects to be the biggest sale it has ever mounted in London. With the international art market booming again after a slump when financial markets crashed, the Christie’s sale also includes a Blue Period portrait by Pablo Picasso, offered by the Andrew Lloyd Webber Foundation founded by the composer, and carrying a price tag about the same as the 1906 Monet.
The Monet, which is to be unveiled on Thursday plus 61 other works on offer, are expected to take the tally on June 23 to £164-£231 million. —Reuters