Pegged at $2.3 mn, SH Raza's artwork remained unsold at Sotheby’s auction

An SH Raza artwork auction is usually a blink and miss, as his works get picked up in a matter of minutes. Not so much this time though. At Sotheby’s recent Modern & Contemporary South Asian art auction in New York, the veteran artist’s work remained unsold. Interestingly, Raja Ravi Varma’s untitled work clinched $1.7 million at the same auction, setting a record for the artist.

While there was no estimate prize for Raza’s work, titled ‘Ville Provencale’, in the auction catalogue, sources confirm that it was pegged at around $2.3 million. “Sadly, it didn’t sell. But these things do happen in auctions. It did get bidders, but didn’t achieve the estimate it should have. With blue chip works like these, it’s all about that moment,” Sotheby’s India head Gaurav Bhatia said.



Although the 1956 painting has now been returned to its current owner, merely mentioned as ‘property of a gentleman’, there have been some private post sale requests for it. Raza’s painting was part of several other iconic art works brought to India for the sale preview, complete with a private dinner hosted by the French ambassador in its honour of the works’ “wonderful Indo-French connection”.