Yet another Fake at Christies NY September 2016 Indian art auction?

Ahead of Christie’s New York auction of what it claims is a KK Hebbar masterpiece, carrying a ‘Cadell Road’ scribble, aficionados are pointing to a strikingly similar painting hanging in a Hyderabad museum and asking: Why would an artist make two identical paintings? Is one of them a fake?

If there are two identical paintings, then is it possible that an artist could have made both? Or is one a fake for sure?

These are the questions surrounding an artwork by the late artist Kattingeri Krishna Hebbar (better known as KK Hebbar) that international auction house Christie’s will put under the hammer in New York on September 14. Titled ‘Sunshine’ and signed by the artist, the oil on canvas work is part of this auction as Lot No 686 and estimated to fetch somewhere between Rs 6 lakh and Rs 10 lakh. As it turns out, however, the Salar Jung Museum in Hyderabad owns a piece that is almost identical. The painting hangs in the national museum’s contemporary and modern art gallery and is called by a different name — ‘Peacock’.

The one above, being auctioned by Christie’s, is signed ‘Hebbar 83’ and inscribed with the words “Sunshine/ 81 Cadell Road, Bombay - 16” on the reverse. The one below is at Hyderabad’s Salar Jung museum.

The matter came to light on Thursday, with a social media post from a member of Mumbai’s art fraternity. It compared the Christie’s artwork to its twin from Salar Jung and raised important questions on authentication of artworks.

The painting shows a peacock with its neck outstretched, is signed ‘Hebbar 83’ and inscribed with the words “Sunshine/81 Cadell Road, Bombay - 16” on the reverse. The work, supposed to have been painted in 1983, was exhibited last week at a New Delhi preview exhibition of ten works from India that would feature at the New York sale.

Interestingly, the social media post also pointed out that the Salar Jung piece is bigger than the Christie’s piece. Sunshine is 33 cm x 76.2 cm in dimension; the one housed in the Salar Jung — the only Hebbar work that the museum owns — is 210cm x 88.5cm, almost six feet long.

Director of Salar Jung Museum, Dr A Nagendra Reddy, said that Peacock had been bought directly by them in 1966. “It was acquired by the purchase committee and we have had no contact with the artist since,” he said. Records of Peacock on the government’s museum portal states that the painting dates back to 1963 and is a “contemporary painting depicting a peacock in blue, black, purple, green and yellow colours in a wooden frame”.

That sounds a lot like Christie’s Sunshine. Could Hebbar then have painted two such works in different sizes? Perhaps Sunshine was meant as a smaller sketch or study for the larger artwork, Peacock?

Hebbar’s daughter, artist Rekha Hebbar Rao, thinks that is very unlikely. On taking a close look at images of both works along with members of her family, Rekha said, “While I have seen my father make similar works, I have never seen an identical work by him.”

The KK Hebbar Art Foundation, Rekha continued, has drawings and sketches by her father, none of which look like the one with Christie’s. “It is doubtful if the Christie’s work is an original one. The signature on Sunshine doesn’t quite match my father’s despite how it changed over the years. Moreover, the colours on it seem too bright and the brushstrokes unlike his style,” she added.

Peacock was probably made by her father after he returned to Mumbai from his stint at the MS Baroda University, said Rekha. He was enamoured by the local fauna in and around the campus and made a series of such works, one of which also features a white peacock.

“The address on the reverse [81 Cadell Road, Bombay — 16] was something only my father would have known, since it was our old address. However, I cannot confirm if the piece with Christie’s is authentic or not unless I see it in person,” she said.

(Source: Mid-Day, 27th August 2016)

At Lalit Kala Akademi, paintings lose out to the art of the possible

When a painting by the internationally renowned Ram Kumar went missing from the Lalit Kala Akademi and was replaced with a fake in 2003, the art fraternity was shocked. As more paintings have gone missing down the years since, successive governments seem to have been least bothered. 

With the Modi government taking over the affairs of the akademi, the case of the missing paintings appears all but forgotten. A Comptroller and Auditor-General report of 2011-2013 said 14 works of art were missing from the Akademi. “Out of this, nine art works had been missing since 1984, but the Akademi did not take any initiative to trace out the same or fix responsibility,” the report said. 

The Akademi had not maintained any record of movement of the permanent collection prior to August 2013, it said. In 2010-11, when the Akademi transferred some 400 art works to a regional centre, 17 were damaged because they were not handled by a professional agency. The report said the missing paintings were not written off the record even if they were untraceable. No FIR appears to have been lodged or any enquiry committee formed.

Panel’s findings

Nearly 10 years ago, a four-member expert committee was formed to review and authenticate the art works. The committee reported missing Landscape by Ram Kumar, Tandava by J. Swaminathan, Peace by K.K. Hebbar, Monkey God by M.F. Husain, Indian Traditional Girl by I. Jayachandran and two paintings by Somnath Hore. 

The committee authenticated 2,000 works, but seriously questioned the authenticity of 12. The panel could not verify if these were genuine. The work stopped suddenly and resumed in 2007. The paintings continue to be listed as missing. 

The case of the missing paintings forms the essence of a letter written by Ramakrishna Vedala, secretary in charge of the Akademi, in 2013 to the Central Bureau of Investigation. But nothing much happened after that. 

Artists question wisdom of removing Akademi chairperson 

Even as the Lalit Kala Akademi finds itself in the news for reasons other than art, there is a fear that priceless paintings missing from it might have found their way into private galleries. 

What is now grabbing headlines is the government’s sudden takeover of the autonomous Akademi and a group of artists contesting the move in the Delhi High Court. The court had issued notice to the Union government asking why the takeover should not be quashed and a CBI inquiry initiated into the affairs of the Akademi. It is hoped that the court will look into the case of the missing paintings that find a mention in the papers submitted for its scrutiny. 

The artists have questioned the government’s wisdom of removing Kalyan Kumar Chakravarty as Akademi Chairperson. Sources say he has taken several steps to clean up the Akademi and rid it of politics. “He was actually in the process of setting the place in order and his removal comes as a shock,” an Akademi member said. Mr. Chakravarty’s tenure should have lasted till 2017. 

Sources blame a former secretary for mismanagement of the Akademi’s affairs, a charge he denies. While the government has cited financial and administrative irregularities as reasons for the takeover, no one, it appears, has paid any attention to the paintings that have gone missing for long.

(Source: The Hindu, 2 May 2015)

Criminal case against Delhi Art Gallery & others for 'fake allegations'

Dispelling the rumours that some of the works in its Significant Indian Art auction on 27th June 2014 were fakes, Bid & Hammer (B&H) has filed a suit under section 200 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 read with sections 499 and 500 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, read with section 66a of the Information Technology Act, 2000, before Justice M C Nada Gowda, IInd Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Bangalore, against Ashish Anand of the Delhi Art Gallery (DAG) and others for “defaming” them by making “allegations and insinuations that are clearly and palpably false and render a highly negative image of the works brought to auction by the complainant, despite the highly credible process of authentication. These allegations not only undermine the reputation of the complainant and its directors, experts and employees but also of its consignors such as grand-daughter of the Maharaja of Burdwan, freedom fighter Radha Devi Goenka, actress Namrata Shirodkar and others”.

Buoyed by its recent landmark victory in an art authenticity case, in this suit B&H has dwelt at length about its “formidable reputation as the open market auctioneer of genuine art, artifacts and original paintings of well reputed artists”. It also speaks about the rich legacy of the 1000 year old Dadha family – promoters of the auction house who have been in business for 100 years. “The accused (DAG) have made imputations intentionally and deliberately without clarifications from the complainant to undermine and tarnish the reputation of the complainant in the society,” the defamation suit said. The other accused are Abhilasha Ojha, Kishore Singh and the Times of India newspaper group.

B&H has submitted evidence to establish that in a bid to sabotage its auction and mislead the art collecting fraternity the accused (DAG) continuously posted “offensive material” on social networking sites and made other such undue attempts to tarnish its goodwill and create mistrust among prospective bidders by orchestrating a smear campaign to thwart the auction. Ashish Anand had claimed that 90% of the works were fakes and quoted “The recent development with regard to the authenticity of works by masters at a forthcoming auction has sent alarm bells ringing once again. How do we regulate this? Especially when experts have given their opinion, which is negative, in regard to a very large body of works. We hope people will support our cause and the framing of an art council will attend to all such matters with due urgency”. However, B&H pointed out that as per a news article on 27th June 2014 it was Delhi Art Gallery that had been guilty of selling a fake Rabindranath Tagore work to art collector Vatsal Poddar. Also, Ashish Anand was one of the first few to order a copy of the catalogue when it came out weeks in advance, then why did he wait till the auction day to go to the media asks Ankush Dadha, Director of B&H, as he goes on to state, “A call for a regulatory body spearheaded by a coterie of competitors just on the eve of our auction was in absolute bad taste with the only intent to directly and indirectly scuttle the success of our auction”. He further added, “in any which way such a body will not be tenable as tainted members & art cartels may sit on it to manipulate the market”.

The cause of friction stems from B&H deciding not to accept consignments from DAG after its inaugural auction in January 2008. Even at B&H’s last paintings auction in Delhi DAG and its associates continued their onslaught by making the following statement to a newspaper “Bangalore based Bid & Hammer’s attempt to grab a bite of the lucrative Delhi market has been viewed with something akin to suspicion”, thus demonstrating their insecurity at B&H’s forays in the Delhi art scene. On that occasion DAG had unscrupulously spoken on the provenance of the Ravi Varma works in B&H’s catalogue, a jibe that was silenced by B&H’s rejoinder to the newspaper and followed up by the comprehensive victory in the suit against Kiran Nadar. More recently DAG has also been trying to enter the auction space on its own which has created confusion among buyers due to the conflicts of interest such a model presents – a gallery is meant to be the primary market and an auction house the secondary market and a clear distinction between the two is in the best interest of the buyer. DAG should realize this without trying to compete in an undignified manner to polarize experts and monopolize the market.

Ashish Anand’s tactic of attacking others and claiming that they proliferate fakes is only a defense mechanism to safe-guard his unverified stock hoarding of over 30,000 works, which he has been desperately trying to offload. The numbers are too astounding and to add to the mystery is whether all the works are authentic and carry provenance documents and purchase receipts – thing’s that are easily fabricated by forgers these days. By being seen at auction rooms and picking up a work or two doesn’t imply that the rest of one’s inventory pile can be passed off as genuine. Only a thorough investigation of his transactions can throw light on this.

Nonetheless, this suit might give the much needed peek into the conspiracy theories that plague the art market and consequently coerce art dealers into becoming more transparent.

Rajani Prasanna, daughter of artist K K Hebbar who had also joined hands with Ashish Anand in this smear campaign by questioning the works by her father, very peculiarly did not check the certificate issued by her own sister Rekha Rao. The auction house plans to implead the sisters as well in the suit.

B&H’s competitive pricing has regularly created unease among the dominating local gallery owners who potentially risk losing out on clients that have paid inflated prices for works purchased through them in the past. As a result these gallery owners are ganging-up and indulging in mud slinging. In the higher interest of Indian art, with the objective of quelling such unhealthy attitudes and DAG’s persistent attempts to malign its prowess, B&H, through this suit, has sought for “appropriate action against the accused persons in accordance with law for the offences committed, by punishing them and grant such other further reliefs as are just”.

(Source: http://www.indianshowbiz.com/?p=83498) 

Related Posts:

1. Bengaluru court orders police probe into 'fake art' case | Deccan Herald | 20 March 2015

2. Ravi Varma painting not fake: K'taka HC appointed arbitrator | Defamation Suit filed against Delhi Art Gallery | The First Mail | 15 February 2015  
3. Due Diligence for all art works put on sale | Business-Standard | 22 March 2015