Published by Louise Chen
Originally published on artinfo.com, June 19, 2010
http://www.blouinartinfo.com/market-news/article/34923-tagore-works-lead-sothebys-south-asian-art-sale-to-82-million
Indian Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore headlined the South Asian Art Sale in London last night, not with his famous manuscripts, but with 12 paintings that fetched £1.6 million ($2.37 million), massively exceeding their £250,000 ($370,000) estimate. The evening sale, which also featured works by prominent South Asian artists Raza, Souza, and Chandra, managed a 78 percent sell-through rate and brought in £5.5 million ($8.2 million) for the house.
Other highlights of the auction included Haider Raza's Rajasthan,which went for £527,250 ($780,000). Last week, Christie's London sold Raza’s Saurashtra for an artist-record $3.4 million.
Of the 12 Tagore lots on offer from the Dartington Hall Collection of Leonard and Dorothy Elmhirst,Portrait of a Woman went for £223,250 ($330,000), resetting the artist record achieved when his Death Scene sold for £144,500 ($214,000) at Sotheby's in 2008. The ink-on-paper work Lady with a Fan — purportedly a portrait of Lady Ranu Mukherjee, a famed Indian socialite and a close friend of Tagore in his twilight years — earned £103,250 ($153,000).
Originally a gift from Tagore to the Elmhirsts 71 years ago, the paintings had been kept in their Dartington Hall Trust in Devon since then. The announcement of the sale generated political tension, due to the belief of some Indian art organizations that the paintings should be returned to India. Before the sale, a senior official from India’s Culture Ministry went to London to press the issue, but Sotheby's officials argued that the Indian government had no legal claim on the paintings. The Indian government did not bid in the auction.
A prominent family with a 300-year history in the country’s culturalrealm, the Tagores played a significant role in the Bengal Renaissance, a social reform movement that began in the late 19th century and ran through the early20th century. A quintessential polymath, Tagore produced 2,000 paintings, composed 2,230 songs, and penned the national anthems for both Bangladeshand India.
After dropping out of law school at University College London, Tagore returned to India, founding the publication Sadhana while managing his family's estate between 1891 and 1895. After achieving success in the arts, he traveled the world as a cultural emissary, influencing authors from Japan's Yasunari Kawabata to France's Andre Gide.
India is currently staging a yearlong celebration of Tagore's 150th birthday, which has triggered a surge in sales of his literary worksin India. In New York, meanwhile, his family name continues on in the form of the Sundaram Tagore gallery in Chelsea, whose eponymous owner, a former director at PaceWildenstein (now Pace), is a descendant of Rabindranath Tagore.