Saffronart’s Summer Online Auction, achieved a total sale value of INR 22.68 crores (USD 3.5 million). Works by Valay Shende, Atul Dodiya, Adeela Suleman, Tayeba Begum Lipi, Arunkumar H G, Senaka Senanayake, Surendran Nair and Dhananjay Singh saw enthusiastic bidding and exceeded their pre-sale estimates. 74% of the contemporary lots on offer were sold. The auction, which featured a selection of works by artists from the South Asian subcontinent, reflected Saffronart’s efforts at repositioning a market that has been seeing a slow revival.
Valay Shende’s Lot 92, Untitled, a sculpture of a buffalo made from welded metal discs, sold at INR 43 lakhs (USD 67,500) against an estimate of INR 30 – 35 lakhs (USD 46,875 – 54,690). The artist’s claim to fame is his highly successful public sculpture, Dabbawalla, at Haji Ali in Mumbai. Lot 75, Atul Dodiya’s Five Drips from Vesuvius, sold at 33.8 lakhs (USD 52,800) against a pre-sale estimate of INR 16 – 22.4 lakhs (USD 25,000 – 35,000). Dodiya’s painting incorporates text in a conceptual form, and is a tribute to Girish Dahiwale, an artist from Mumbai. Lot 64, a 1984 oil on canvas by Sri Lankan artist Senaka Senanayake sold at INR 7.29 lakhs (USD 11,400), crossing its upper estimate of INR 6.4 lakhs (USD 10,000). Lots 66 and 69, installations by Pakistani artist Suleman and Bangladeshi artist Lipi, sold at INR 5.95/USD 9,300 (pre-sale estimate: INR 2.56 – 3.8 lakhs/ USD 4,000 – 6,000) and INR 5.37 lakhs/USD 8,400 (pre-sale estimate: INR 3.8 – 5.1 lakhs/USD 6,000 – 8,000) respectively.
Among the modernists, works by Ganesh Pyne, B Prabha, Sadanand Bakre and Thota Vaikuntam witnessed energetic bidding. The results show an unexpected interest in artists other than those who have typically led auctions, such as the Bombay Progressives, Prabha, Pyne, Bakre. The lots leading the sale consisted of F N Souza’s The Herald (lot 39) and Tyeb Mehta’s Falling Figure (lot 98)—sold at Rs 2 crores (USD 330,012) and 4.27 crores (USD 667,500) respectively. Both works come from important phases of the artists’ careers.
