Artists in the pre-2006 art boom had started aligning themselves with galleries like Bodhi, Sakshi  and Delhi Art Gallery as also Indian galleries abroad like Bose Pascia, Sundaram Tagore,etc. These and many other galleries had developed among themselves a wide network of art-curators, buyers and tied up with other galleries abroad. They  had succeeded in artificially pushing the prices upwards and it is said that prices went up to almost 3oo times in a span of just three years in case of some artists like Subodh Gupta, Bharti Kher, Pareh Maity, Jitish Kallat and Atul Dodia.

Attracted by this sudden rise of art-prices, new investors entered the market. However it was well realized in 2007 itslef that this artificial price rise was not sustainable. But such information was kept secret and galleries made money as long as it was possible. Demand for certain kinds of works increased dramatically and the galleries started mass-producing these works. Nobody knows as how many steel-utensil paintings Subodh Gupta made or how many faces Riyas Komu made. some estimates say there are more than a thousand such paintings available in the market today. Artists also started emulating each other and made similar looking pieces for an expanding market. Reena Kallat and Jitish Kallat’s works became indistinguishable so did the works made by GR Iranna and Rameshwar Broota.

Also during this time most artists started making installations. Simple mannequins painted in acrylic colours was one of the most widely seen installations made by artists of almost all galleries.

Repetition, similar looking works and mass production made the art market look more like a craft market. Such art-works should have never been priced so high. But artists continued to sell them at exorbitant rates. The result is a glut in the market. Today many collectors are not getting back even 30% of the prices that they had once paid for certain artists. According to many recent studies, these artists will probably never reach their pre-boom prices. The art-guides are now advising their clients to sell off their stocks at  20-25% of their buying prices. Intelligent investors are doing exactly that before prices fall further.

The collectors are however equally to be blamed for their misfortune. Greed and mad rush to buy high selling artists led them to ignore rationality. During the boom period there were many artists who were selling individually and their works were available cheap. These artists maintained their individuality, produced very little and as such their works are so few in the market that they will always have a resale value.

Devajyoti Ray is one such artist. Ray’s works were available at about Rs 4000 per square feet in 2005 and increased by about 15% in the next two years. While his works traveled every where, he stayed out of the gallery circuit. Though prominent galleries did display his works, he never worked with them. He retained his identity and produced very little. People who invested in 2005-06, can now reap a profit of about 40% on the invested value. Some of his works reaped double the 2006 value. Recent shows in Europe and Middle East have pushed his prices further upwards.

Ray’s works available in very few numbers. His style is unique and he is also widely credited as the initiator of a new genre : Pseudorealism.  Ray will be exhibiting his works this year end at Mumbai.  It will feature 26 of recent paintings. While other artists are selling off their works at lower prices, Ray’s works will be available at a slightly higher price. This is a welcome trend.

A slow but steady rise in prices is sustainable and always ensures sure (even though conservative) profits for investors. The show will be followed by another one in Dubai where his prices according to independent observers are likely to rise by another 10-12%.

While the Hindu organisations were attacking Husain (some even destroyed some of his paintings worth in crores of Rupees), the Government did almost nothing to stop these activities. These organisations had also foisted a host of unsubstantiated criminal cases against Husain and then too government did almost nothing to withdraw these cases.

Finally Husain had to leave the country where he was born, and settle down in Middle-East. In protest of such a shabby treatment meted out to him, Husain also surrendered his Indian citizenship and took a Qatari one. The international art community criticized India for being so tolerant and docile towards the communal forces.

When Husain finally passed away, the PM and other ministers wasted no time to send their condolences. They also stated that they were willing to send any help to Husain’s family if required. But nonetheless, Husain today remains in records as an Indian born Qatari artist.

How far is this change in Husain’s official status important for the Indian art scene? Well to be precise, only marginally. Most of Husain’s major works are with Indian collectors. His later day works which he had made after leaving India are also not very significant. The only such work that is likely to come up in some future auction is an unfinished one that Husain was supposed to be making for the Qatar’s royal family.

But Husain was important to India for many other reasons. Firstly, he was the most flamboyant artist that India had ever produced. He had succeeded in grabbing media attention even in those days when Indian art market was very nascent. His style statements, his eccentric behaviour and his public declarations of his infatuations towards Indian film actresses had all created an enigma and together they helped not just Husain but also the Indian art market as a whole.

The present generation of artists who are today seeing all the international attention are thus in many way indebted to Husain.

But there was also one another aspect of Husain, which made him different from others of his time. It was his original style. Originality of style had always been the most important factor in any artist’s rise. There were only two other artists before MF Husain, who had acquired international fame within their life time.  They were Raja Ravi Verma and Jamini Roy ( May be Rabindranath Tagore also, to a certain extent). These artists were not as flamboyant as Husain. Their only reason for fame was their original styles.

Husain’s death is a loss to India not because he became a Qatari citizen but because today there is no one else who can match him either in terms of his originality or in terms of his flamboyance. And today when the art market is in recession, the Indian market does need someone who can create a little drama, generate a little interest in his style, and shake the slothness in the market.

So who are the possible market leaders of the future?

One name that comes automatically is that of Subodh Gupta. He has done something few else are doing: creating huge steel sculptures and showing them the world over. He is flamboyant too and known to create a good deal of controversies around himself as well. But the problem with Gupta is that he is not very original. The charm of his works lie mostly in the size. Most of what he makes like skulls, UFOs, etc have all been made if not by steel, then by something else.

Anish Kapoor, London based Indian origin artist is known for his concept and style. Highly original, Kapoor has enchanted the international audience with his conceptual works of art. However much though, some Indian art galleries are trying to project Kapoor as an Indian artist, it will not in the totality help the Indian art market.

Atul Dodiya and Bose Krishnamachari who had been making some ripples a few years back are conceptually strong, but Atul Dodiya’s works have often been criticized for not being very original in rendering. Besides, Dodiya had never been known to create any drama under the arch light. He is a low profile artist, on whom the art market cannot depend for a major overall surge.

Bose had shown great strength not only as an artist but also as an organiser, and these strengths are requisite at a time when the buyers and collectors internationally want articulated ideas about art works that they are investing in. But Bose’s recent ventures have all failed ( particularly the one he had drawn up with industrialist and collector Yash Birla).

Among the younger artists Sandip Pisalkar, Susanta Mandal, Devajyoti Ray and Nancy Adajania are some of the names that are also to be watched in future. Pisalkar and Mandal are both conceptual artists and delve mostly in the field of installationas and assemblages. Both have aquired quite a bit of fame and some of their works have been acquired even by international collectors. Susantha Mandal‘s works have even been collected by the Guggenheim Museum in 2009.

But Mandal or Pisalkar are not very articulate. Their works also do not lend themselves to instant identification with the artists. In this regards Devajyoti Ray is someone to be followed. He is highly original and has popularised his style of Pseudorealism which is not just something unique but also highly recognisable and makes it remember the artist instantly.  The original style of Pseudorealism has given Devajyoti Ray instant recognition and also a little bit of notoriety.

Ray is also highly articulate and has single-handedly organised shows and given lectures at self-organised talk shows and is thus best suited for generating the much needed academic and aesthetic reasons which collectors look for before investing in any art work. There is now a PhD thesis done on Ray’s works, a French book written on his importance in the field of Indian art and a couple of documentaries in the pipeline on his style pf Psudorealism.

But Ray too has a problem. He is too young and new and it is too early for one to tell if he can emerge as a leader.

Nancy Adjania is a recent artist and though she has created enough ripples, and this years official entrant to Art Fair in Madrid, it would take time for her to make any real impact in the art world. Similar other names are also emerging. However yet it is too early to guess as who can take up Husain’s place not just as an artist but also as someone who can pull the entire art market, a pull form which everyone else benefits.

But most pundits stayed out of the Summit. Important Galleries and auction houses made only a cursory visit. It is rumoured that to fill up the space, galleries based in New Delhi were given halls at throwaway rents at the last moment. Inspite of all these loopholes, the Summit was not entirely a failure as many of India’a budding artists sold good number of works and moderate galleries made good profits.

The limited success was expected to attract many more galleries the next year, ie in 2009. But recession set in and galleries like Bodhi, Sakshi, Delhi Art Gallery just vanished leaving investors chasing them for all their money. So Delhi Art Summit organisers brought in marginal and fringe galleries from many third world countries to fill up the space. The Star attractions were the sculptures of Anish Kapoor who had sent two of his small works at the request of one of his collectors. Another attraction was the sculpture park, where Subodh Gupta had installed some mammoth exhibits.

Again business was dull. But the organisers spread the gossip that a total of Rs 2 Crore worth of profits were reaped by the galleries. It is only a month later that gradually the actually figures started trickling out. It was then found that the two sculptures sent by Anish Kapoor was already sold three years previous to the exhibition. Also it was revealed that the Rs 2 Crose figure was many folds inflated and grossly inaccurate.

The organisers developed cold feet by now. By the middle of 2010, many more galleries have shut down. Instead a new trend is being observed where erstwhile collectors have started opening galleries. Why? In the hope that their accumulated stock of paintings would sell from these galleries.

The organisers of the Summit first tried to approach these new galleries but even they did not want to spend any money now. So The summit organisers finally dropped the idea of another summit. Now there will be only a summit in February 2011. But the fair does not seem very encouraging.

As of now, the galleries that are participating are the ones which had not been active for a very long time. Delhi based galleries like Gallery Ganesha, Espace and Art Konsult had not been seen for a very long time. They have not done any major show in the past three years. Another participating gallery, the Delhi Art Gallery does not have any gallery space any more and only have a web-site which too have not been updated for a very long time.

Mumbai based galleries Tao Art Gallery was closed for the large part of 2009 and 2010. The other galleries from Mumbai are Volte and The Loft, both very new.

A set of names like Gallery Mirchandani, Aicon, Gallery 88, etc are also not active and they are al looking for avenues to offload their old stock. So it seems that the Art Summit is most likely to be an attempt to offload old stocks, while there is very less likelihood of seeing fresh works.

Can such an arrangement help the Art Market? We cannot answer yet. In between there are the Commonwealth games, where too most of these same set of galleries will be showcasing their accumulated works. If  Commonwealth helps in some business, perhaps that will act as an indication for the Art Summit.

Saffronart, one of Indai’s best known auction houses had held as many as seven exhibition-cum-auctions of Indian Contemporary art in the year 2007.  In 2009, the number of such auctions reduced to only two. This year Saffronart till date has not held any such show.

In 2008-09, Saffrontart made scanty sales and now the organisation is not even putting up artworks for sale. Upto 2007, Saffronart had been including newer artists every year. In 2009, they alsmost packed up their appraisal wing. All these are clear indications of a rapid clearing house effort on the part of Saffronart.

The last nail of the coffin however arrives now as Saffronart ventures into real estate abandoning art completely. Saffronart this year announced its alliance with Cushman & Wakefield, a privately held real estate services firm of Bangalore.

What is surprising is not the deal however, as Saffronart has always involved in multifarious business activities. But this is the first time Dinesh Vazirany , CEO of Saafronart has allowed the Saffronart premise for the launching and promoting of its real-estate business, that too when the business venture is not fully owned by Saffronart.

Is then this a deathnail for art auctions?

The happy news is that it is not.

The curious story of saffronart’s packing up should be read in continuation with the stories of fall of other great art houses like Delhi Art Gallery, Bodhi Art, Threshold Gallery, etc. All these galleries were once the toasts of art business in India but in 2009, all these galleries were found to be indulging dubious business games, most were found to flouting norms and many predicted their fall by the end of 2010. The early closure of the arthouse should be read in this context.

Saffronart had internal links with other galleries like the ones mentioned above and together they promoted only a set of artists, many of whose reputations were questionable. A look at the artists promoted by Bodhi, Saffronart, Sakshi, and Delhi Art Gallery shows a curious repetations of names, even though these galleries on the front claimed to be independent of each other. Most of these artists were made stars by the conglomerate of these dubious players in the field of art business. Artists like Shilpa Gupta, Anindita Chudhuri, Chitra Ganesh and Sudarshan Shetty rose up by the grace of such dubious business strategies. They enjoyed an artificial pushing up of prices by the galleries interselling among themselves.

Today when the truth has come out, most of these artists have pilled up stocks of artworks and nothing is selling. 

What does all this indicate about future? One, that the packing up of these dubious institutions is not entirely a bad thing. It gives space for more genuine art houses and artists who were long being ignored by the market. Important curators like Jyotindra Jain who had always worked outside the influence of these art houses now get more media space. Similarly artists like S Ravi Shankar, Anish kapoor, Sach Jafri, who were always known abroad but remained largely ignored by galleries like Bodhi and auction houses like Saffronart will now get pride of prominence.

Many international art houses like Borubudur, Sidhartha Auctineers, Sotheby’s etc are still into buying Indian art, but their target is now emerging names with solid credentials. New Galleries like Nature Morte, Cinnamon Art House, Novelty Colours, etc are the ones to look for good investible and reasonable art.

Indian art is still selling more than artworks from other South Asian countries but it is perhaps the best art to put money in in the internatioanl market. But business is no longer possible in the way theses dubious galleries did. Its is time now to invest in newer artists and understand newer concepts in art like Superflat, Pseudorealism, Fluxus, Magic realism and Post Cynicism, which are now shaping the art world’s thinking. At the height of art boom, nobody tried to understand the trends, theories and emerging languages of art world.

Now it is time to understand them and then go for calculated risks in buying the artworks of these artists.

The slump in the art market was caused by a set of galleries which peddled substandard art to unassuming buyers by promising them huge returns on such investments. These galleries hired artists with whom they could negotiate with ease. The quality of an artist’s works never mattered to these galleries but what mattered was how malleable the artist was.

A look at the web-sites of the galleries will reveal that most of these galleries peddled the art of only their own artists and none else. They did expensive shows for these artists and propagated the view that their own artists were the best in the world. They also promised an annual growth in returns on investments made on the artists of their galleries to unsuspecting buyers.

Such false promises were never supported by any discourse on the artists works. The buyers who were anyway not looking for any discourse but for a good avenues for investment blindly followed the galleries and when the recession set in, they suddenly saw huge sums of money suddenly getting trapped in rubbish, which was earlier called art.

Art is to be understood and appreciated before money is put in them. Good art gets connected to you in the first instance. In the west, the best of art collectors do not buy unless they like a piece of art. But in India, art collecteors never showed patience in understanding art and put their money into whatever their trusted galleries wanted them to. Galleries behaved like share market brokers and art collecteors like them that way. 

To make things look more credible, the galleries also tied up with many curators, art magazines and thus magazine coteries were formed in which only certain artists were promoted, irrespective of the artists’ qualitites.

In the post recession phase, on should not forget this dark chapter of art market in India, when best artists were ignored, and the cheats and fraudstars were promoted by galleries and art magazines. In 2010, market indications show a slight revival in the art market. But art collectors are now negotiating with the artists directly. This is an welcome trend. In a recent show organised by a gallery in Mumbai of famous artist Satish Gujral, buyers refused to buy anything simply because the artist himself was not present.

So how far to trust galleries these days? The answer is in the air: trust art and artist. Do not trust galleries.  And do not trust magazines also. Indian art magazines are nothing better than propaganda pamhlets.

The other newspaper are also in doubt, except for The Hindu which among the A- category English dailies, still covers art. Hindu has always been sincere about art. Its Bangalore edition features articles oif such important artists as Yusuf Arakkal and its Kolkata edition recently saw a good indepth analysis of how the art market functions. The same The Hindu has recently come up with a mind boggling article about artist Devajyoti Ray. It described the Devajyoti Ray as the father of Pseudorealism. Soon anothe important weekly The Week carried a story on the new emerging phenomenon, that is Devajyoti Ray. Then came the Gulf Times in Dubai and the Asian Art Journal, all describing Ray as something a little short of the face of contemporary Indian Art.

So how far are these reports to be believed?

That Devajyoti Ray has initiated a new style of art called Pseudorealism is undoubted. That Ray has sold some of his paintings in the Middle East is also acceptable, particularly because Ray’s works are paticularly in demand with the Hilton Chain of Hotels. But Ray is not yet the numero uno. There are others too. Sushanta Mandal is one. So is Babu Xavier, Gurusiddappa and many others.

Ray is an academic artist, whose works are academically highly rated. But how good are they from the point of view of investment is yet to be ascertained. One important show of ray will be the one to be held at Mumbai’s Museum Gallery this year. This show will be widely seen. In fact this will be the first major art show of the year in Mumbai. One must wait and see.

So whose works and which works?

Jogen Choudhury, Vaikuntham, Jeram Patel, A Ramachandran, Atul Dodiya are all good artists but they are known mostly for their old full-bodied works. Jogen Choudhury’s coloured works on canvas are however very rare and one can buy them only from select galleries. This is true for Vaikunthan also. But the demand of the market has made these artists sell many raw sketches. Most Indian galleries have these sketches which are of dubious merits. Vaikunthan has for long stopped making good full bodied works and is making only charcoal sketches on canvas for the past six years. These works have not much aethetic value but galleries often sell then at huge prices. A Ramachandra, Ganesh Paine, Atul Dodiya and now even Yusuf Arakkal and Dattatreya Apte are selling rough easy sketches to unsuspecting buyers. The most dubious of these works are by Jeram Patel. He spreads black ink on paper without any shape and then sells these works through some Gujrat based art galleries of dubious distinctions.

Another set of artists of late have started making digital works worked on by assistants in large numbers. These works look like full bodied coloured works but are actually imitations of old works of the artist. If these works are sold by people who are not associated with the artist, these will come under the category of digital fakes. But having come from the artists’ studios, they are often priced highly. Artists who are doing this kind of works include Chaintan Upadhyay, Amit Ambalal, Hema Upadhyay, Bharti Kher to start with. The galleries that are selling these works are not the ones that the artists initially worked with. Why? One should try to think.

Abstarct works are the third kind of works that often come from established artists. Abstarct works are easy to make and when the demand for a certain artist’s works increase some artists shift to quick-make abstracts. Paresh Maity started with beautiful watercolours for which he became famous. Soon Maity shifted to easy semi-abstract canvas paintings. But of late Maity has started making pen sketches on readymade photographs, hoping that these substandard works will also sell at the same kind of high prices. Other artists who have earlier got into abstarct mode include Harshavardhan, Manish Pushkale, Sudhir Talmane, etc. None of the abstarct works are today selling at even 30% of their boom-time prices.

The moral of the story is that good artists are good but not all their works are good. Artists make many sketches in notebooks, do many experimentations with colours but these are not final products and as such do not always have merits. Such works also come to the market but are definitely not investible. Abstract works, digital prints, etc coming from important artists may not be important in actuality.

A wise investor is one who invests in the good works of good artists and wait for the prices to rise.  Here is quick guide to buy what from whom

• A Ramachandran  :  old Yayati centric works,  self protraits, etc. Medium : Oil on Canvas
• Balraj Panesar :  Collages and new acrylic on canvas works
• Chittrobhanu Majumdar : Old semi abstract oil on canvas works
• Devajyoti Ray : Pseudorealist works. Medium : Acrylic on Canvas
• Farhad Husain : Oil on Canvas works.
• Ganesh Paine : Old Gouache works, Oil on canvas and even water colours. Avoid rough sketches on notebook sheets

 An exhaustive list is not possible to create, but and the list given here can only be used as a guide. The catchline is : Buy good stuff and avoid bad stuff even if it come from big names.

The influential art houses would sell art works of an artist to their own networked clientelle without actual exchange of money and give huge press-publicity. Repeated such moves would lead to a positive expectation in the art market and soon investors will flock to the market to buy such art-works. After a short span of time, the artist’s works would be put up again for sale, this time at an higher prices. The art houses in the nexus would even offer to buy back the art works earlier sold at these higher prices. This would create even more of positive expectation and now more investors would flock in. Then suddenly the art houses would put for sell a large number of art works at very high prices and reap the profit.

The investors during the boom period never asked about the quality of art. They had been investing because of the possibility of quick money. But the system which was generating this quick money possibilities could not be sustained for ever. The market was bound to crash. Even if there had not been a recession, the system was bound to fail.

Now we are entering into a mature phase, where investors are willing to learn more about art before investing. So what are the qualitites of good art?

Though the value of art is intrinsic and what is good for one may not be good for other, yet there are certain basic features which can be easily discerned about good art.  Here we would enumerate the features that an investor should look for in the artworks in which he/she is planning to invest.

1. Do not invest in artists who have already sold a large number of art works in the market, or whose works are available in a large number of galleries. Because these artworks are easily available, it would always be difficult for an investor to sell off these works. Art works which are not easily available or are available in a limited number of galleries are difficult to buy but easy to sell.

2. Investing in art works which are easy to make are also not good options. Since they are easy to make, they can me made in large numbers if there is a sudden demand for these works. This will then cause the problem of selling.
3. More an artwork is striking, and more it is different from what is available in market, the better it is from investment point of view. Striking art works are difficult to make and that is why they remain striking. The demand for these art works will only increase and their prices are also likely to increase.

4. An art work is an exclusive product. Exclusiveness is what what distinguishes it from crafts and other decorative items available in market. So investing in exclusive art works is always a good option. The more exclusive an art-work is the better it is.

5. Can one trust important art-critics in evaluation of art-works? There is no clear answer for this question. But most importnant art critics are not independent and are in the payroll of important art houses. They only appreciate their own inhouse artists. The frauds that took place in Indian art market two years back had been caused with the aid of many such critics.

6. Then without critic how to know what is exclusive art? Trust your senses. There is nothing much to understand in art. An art-work should apeal to you. If it does, it is an investible option. However once you have liked an artwork, try to talk to the artist and gather information about him from the artist himself.

As it is good art has three important qualities: Originality, exclusivity and limited quantity

All this has made the Magazine a part of a nexus of a handful of artists, galleries and collectors. Some of the major players in this nexus was Saffron Art Auction House, the Visual Arts Gallery, and galleries like Sakshi and Art Home.

Between 2000 and 2006, Visual Arts Gallery and its chairperson Alka Pandey supported New Delhi based artist Jorge Martin. Jorge Martin was given the Most Promising Artist award by Visual Arts inhouse foundation. Then Alka Pandey got some false sales done for the artist. She was supported in this matter by Rohit Gandhi of Palette Art Gallery. One can now see that the nexus had helped Alka Pandey and her artist Jorge Martin to get at least eight reviews written on Arts India Magazine during this period. This was something totaly unethical.

Abhay Sardesai, the editor of the Arts India Magazine has always been supportive of artists like Bharti Kher, Subodh Gupta and Jitish Kallat. It has now been found that this three artists cornered 30% of all writeups in the Arts India Magazine till date.

The Arts India Magazine had been curiously silent on important Indian artists like Sushant Mandal whose works were aquired by the Guggenheim Museum, which was a very rare acheivement. The Arts India Magazine had been silent about Akumal Ramachander who had been honoured by the Polish Government specifically for immense contribution to art. Artist Devajyoti Ray’s painting was aquired two years back by Fine Arts Museum, Havana. This too was mostly ignored by the Arts India Magazine. These are all independent achievements by some of India’s best artists. But sans support from big houses, these artists have remained mostly unknown in India.

That Arts India magazine has been indulging in these nefarious activieties and promoting only some inhouse artists in the name of journalism is well known now. With the help of SaffronArt Auction house, the prices of these same set of artists was also increased artificially by many folds.  According to David McNamura, an independent art observer, “Most contemporary artists whose prices had been above five lakh rupees for a piece of work, the pre-recession price may not ever be reached again in the internatioanl market”  

The artists and galleries that were once a part of the coterie are now worst-hit in the recession and their credibility is in doldrums.

But Indian Art world still requires art magazines for the dissemination of information. However it is high time that these magazines are also guided by certain guidelines and are kept under the purview of PTI. For this the government should take initiative and so should PTI to cater news related to art matters to the press as well as these magazines.

It is necessary that buyers and investors in the field of art take only such news as acceptable which come from independent sources and not from magazine’s inhouse writers.

Critics and academicians had been critical about these painters for the past one decade but the art market has generally ignored the academicians. Galleries encouraged these artists as they could produce art works in large numbers. Some of these artists used assistants, machines, and computer printers to produce art works in mass. Some artists are rumored to have produced entire set of 30 to 40 works in just one night before the exhibition. For galleries with good networks, these artists proved like gold mines. Some collectors had always preferred to buy in large numbers in one go. While serious artists who produced very little could not cater to such collectors, abstract artists could always do so with ease. Galleries therefore preferred such artists.

There is no criteria to judge abstract works. In figurative works one can judge the strength of the artist by seeing the drawing, the impact of colours on contours. In abstract one has no way to judge an art work. Buyers between 2000 and 2006 depended solely on the recommendations of paid curators.

This process was not sustainable and now there is suddenly an overflow of abstract works. Every collector of such abstract works often come out with huge publicity stunts to popularise their artists and thereby sell away their works. But the problem is all abstract works are with similar collectors and all the collectors are today trying to offload their stocks.

This is therefore not a time to invest in abstract works. Invest in good figurative works like those of Shibu Natesan, Devajyoti Ray and  Paresh Maiti and among the veterans, invest in Haku Shah, Lalu Prosad Shaw, and Subrata Gangopadhyay.

If you have already invested in abstract art and would like to offload your stock, sell them slowly. You may get back 70% of what you have invested. Yet it is better to disinvest. At present most collectors are waiting and watching. Very soon they would all try to sell off their stocks. Then the prices are going to fall by another 20 to 30%. So even if you incur loss, sell them now.