The New York Times Somini Sengupta felt the need to condescend to the Indian Art Summit by finding the “quality of works varied much more widely than at that premier New York art fair, and there was a lot less money involved.” Perhaps to make up for that bit of snobbery, she provides us with a few sketchy sale details:

One gallery owner from Mumbai said she was somewhat unprepared for what happened on preview day, before the fair opened to the public, when all three editions of a $13,000 neon light-and-acrylic piece by Tejal Shah, a young Mumbai artist, were snapped up by buyers. A New Delhi gallery sold 10 contemporary pieces, including photographs, paintings and sculpture, at prices ranging from $7,700 to $270,000.

Other dealers reported sales of contemporary Indian works for as much as $400,000. And two sold paintings by Picasso, each of which went for more than $1 million.

Zehra Jumabhoy adds a little more street-level knowledge of the scene:Continue Reading

The Indian Art Summit gave some facts and figures to the Financial Times. The last edition of the fair was held in August of 2009. The new date may have nothing to do with the jump in attendance but 2009 saw 40,000 visitors. This year’s event had 128,000 which puts it above Frieze and ArtBasel Miami Beach together:

• People came, Kirpal told [the FT], with her seamless command of facts and figures, from 67 cities around the world, including 17 in India. Galleries reported 60-70 per cent sales, across all price ranges, but particularly in the $500,000+ bracket, with most of the star attractions (Picassos, a Dalí, works by Souza) all sold. The Indian diaspora was well in attendance, with non-resident Indian (NRI) buyers coming from New York, California and elsewhere. The younger galleries did well with photography and video; there were sales to museums in Israel, Monaco, Australia, Shanghai and elsewhere. Most significantly, perhaps, some galleries reported that as much as 80 per cent of their sales were to first-time collectors.

Full Speed Ahead at the India Art Summit (Financial Times)

The Press Trust of India got some sales information from the organizers of the Indian Art Summit:

• “Out of the European moderns Pablo Picasso sold the most and out of the Indian moderns works by F N Souza were the most widely bought,” said organisers of the four-day India Art Summit which concluded here yesterday. There was a hike in the number of new and first-time buyers at the fair with galleries reporting up to 80 per cent of works sold to new and first time buyers, an increase from 30-40 per cent sold to the same category in the fair”s previous edition.

• “Approximately 80 percent of galleries have sold their work with approximately 10 percent of the booths selling all the works they had brought for the fair,” the organisers said in a statement. Among the works sold included blue chip contemporaries, rare modern works of European, Indian modern artists and emerging artists. International collectors from Hong Kong, US, Europe and Australia, including representatives of museums and institutions who were visiting the fair to gauge the Indian market also purchased works. “We have sold over 50 per cent of our works,” Umer Butt, creative director, Grey Noise, the first Pakistani gallery at the Summit told PTI.

Indian Art Summit Draws Holiday Crowd (PTI)

Picasso, Souza most widely sold at India Art Fair (PTI)

The Wall Street Journal’s India Real Time blog tries to sketch a portrait of the new Indian art collector who is now primarily an NRI or Indian National:

But within this category of buyers, things are rapidly changing. As India’s economy is growing, so is the portion of the population that can afford to invest in art. This means many buyers are actually new to the art market – something that was reflected in last year’s summit when around 40% of sales went to first-time buyers.

As a result, the profile of collectors is changing too. Many new buyers are young, well-traveled corporate executives who made big money working in banking or in the country’s software industry. They tend to be more open to the daring trends of contemporary art than their older counterparts, some of whom are long-time patrons of Indian Modernists.

Who Buys Indian Art? (India Real Times/Wall Street Journal)