Sold for Rs 1,000 in 1960, Padamsee work goes for record Rs 19.19 crore

NEW DELHI: Contemporary Indian artist Akbar Padamsee set a new high at Saffronart’s auction with his work “Greek Landscape” going under the hammer for Rs19.19 crore,

NEW DELHI: Contemporary Indian artist Akbar Padamsee set a new high at Saffronart’s auction with his work “Greek Landscape” going under the hammer for Rs19.19 crore, breaking his earlier record.

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The 4.3 x 12 feet canvas, estimated at Rs7-9 crore, more than doubled its upper estimate in the sale on Thursday evening. The winning bid surpassed the previous record set by Sotheby’s in 2011 for “Reclining Nude”, 1960.

The auction also set other records for modern Indian art as Nasreen Mohamedi’s 1960 oil on canvas sold for a record Rs2.4 crore. “I bought this painting for my personal collection,” said 92-year-old artist Krishen Khanna, an art collector who bought Greek Landscape for roughly Rs1,000 in 1960. Though the specific data remains unavailable, experts are terming it as one of the highest ever price jumps for an artwork.

“I liked the painting and he [Padamsee] is a good friend of mine. This is one of his best paintings so I bought it,” adds Khanna.

“It was my second show at the Jehangir Art Gallery (Mumbai) put up by Bal Chhabda,” says Akbar Padamsee remembering that all the paintings in the show were bought by his fellow artists. “MF Husain bought one work, which was the largest in size — 22 feet and Krishen bought this one. Another one Reclining Nude was bought by actor Shammi Kapoor.”