Collection of abstract art to go under hammer at Prinseps online sale

New Delhi: A 2005 work by leading Indian abstract artist Prabhakar Kolte will go under the hammer at Mumbai-based auction house Princeps' first online day sale of Indian Modern Art on October 9-10.

Kolte, who studied at JJ School of Art in Mumbai, has often been described in relation to Swiss-born artist Paul Klee for their shared technique of weathering stronger colours and adding white pigment to age the work, as demonstrated in the Untitled work that is part of the sale. The painting is estimated between Rs 8 lakh and 12 lakh.

The sale will also have on offer abstract works by other Indian artists including Ganesh Haloi, Sohan Qadri, Paramjit Singh, and Ambadas Khobragade who, inspired by the surrealist idea that art should come from the unconscious mind, pulled away from the traditional and academic European styles. Haloi's Untitled work, painted for the Kargil Welfare Fund, depicts his typical composition of space, colour, form, and narration. It is estimated at Rs 1.50 - 2.50 lakh. Two rare early landscapes by Ghulam Rasool Santosh from the 1950s will also be part of the sale.

While the 1955 work is estimated at Rs 1.50 - 2.50 lakh, the one created in 1956 is expected to fetch Rs 2 - 3 lakh. First spotted by eminent artist S H Raza as a landscape painter in Kashmir, Santosh was best known for his later tantra inspired work which these two lots pre-date. Inspired by post-impressionist painter Paul Cézanne's 'constructive strokes', Santosh's landscapes tend to reduce the subject matter to simple geometric forms. Also part of the sale will be big names like Jamini Roy, F N Souza, Paresh Maity, B Vithal, Ganesh Pyne, Shanti Dave and Abanindranath Tagore.

A rare watercolour postcard by Tagore is of note for having been given by the artist to Pulin Behari Sen, one of the directors of the Visva Bharati Granthana Vibhaga, the internal publication department at Santiniketan. It is estimated at Rs 5 - 6 lakh. "Since I launched Princeps in 2017 we have continued to drive our research-focused approach to the market and I am delighted to share details of our tenth auction to date," Indrajit Chatterjee, founder of Princeps said in a statement. The sale was preceded by previews at the Taj Art Gallery in Mumbai on September 28-29.