Sotheby’s to hold first ever international auction house sale of calligraphy in Doha

ART MARKET ART AUCTIONS CALLIGRAPHY DOHA

Sotheby’s London recently announced it will hold the first ever international auction house sale dedicated solely to calligraphy in Doha, Qatar, at The Ritz-Carlton Doha hotel, on 15 December. The groundbreaking calligraphy auction Hurouf: The Art of the World will showcase various works ranging from very early Islamic calligraphies to a mix of modern and contemporary Arabic, Farsi and Ottoman Turkish works.

Highlights of the forthcoming auction will travel through the Gulf Region prior to sale, one of which being Ali Omar Ermes’ The Fourth Ode which has an estimated price ranging from USD250,000 to USD350,000.

Ali Omar Ermes’s ‘The Fourth Ode’ (acrylic and ink on paper).

Calligraphy is an art form that has influenced the Doha art scene for many years, and Sotheby’s believes this sale represents the region’s past and present talents. Says Roberta Louckx, Sotheby’s Executive Vice President and Head of Sotheby’s in Qatar, in a the press release announcing the sale:

We are delighted to return to Doha later this year with an inaugural auction devoted to ‘calligraphy’, a theme that has inspired and informed the art of this rich and diverse culture throughout the ages – from the production of the first Kufic Qur’ans to the modern and contemporary artworks of Farhad Moshiri. Sotheby’s is strongly committed to the region, and we are extremely excited to present for sale, in Qatar, the creative endeavours of some of the region’s most talented artists, past and present.

According to the press release, the forthcoming calligraphy sale is built on the success of last year’s Doha sales. After opening an office in Doha in 2008, Sotheby’s held maiden sales in March last year during which an Indian carpet made of pearls and gems fetched USD5.5 million, although the Bloomberg article which reported on this sale also mentioned that the prices of the auctions were disappointing in general. As Dalya Islam, Director of Sotheby’s Middle East Arab & Iranian Art Department, states in the press release,

Last year at our Doha sales Sotheby’s achieved solid success for works by highly sought-after Arab artists such as Chafic Abboud, Nabil Nahas, Ayman Baalbaki, Yousef Ahmad and Ali Hassan. In order to build on this, we have decided to devote a sale to works of significant interest to the region, focusing on calligraphy. The Arabic script has stimulated artists for more than a millennium, and is still a highly regarded and revered art form that reflects the rich history of the region. The auction will emphasise the enduring legacy of Islamic art by tracing the development of calligraphy, with a focus on its contemporary manifestation.

CBKM/KN

Related Topics:  market watch – auctions, calligraphy, Middle Eastern artists

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• Christies in Dubai sets record for most pricey Arab artwork – November 2009 – a round-up of what the media was saying at the time
• Catch Palestinian Art in Venice – Islamic art in the spotlight or in a corner? – July 2009 – outlines the Palestine art that debuted at the 53rd Venice Biennale
• Hong Kong artists showcased for first time at Sotheby’s Asian art sale 2009 – April 2009 – some biographic detail on the artists represented
• First forays for Saudi art in international art market – March 2009 – the lowdown on Christie’s first venture into the Saudi art market

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Antonia Carver named Art Dubai director, lends Middle Eastern art insight to fair

ART PROFESSIONALS ART INDUSTRY APPOINTMENTS MIDDLE EASTERN ART INDUSTRY

Antonia Carver, an arts writer and administrator who is often credited with pushing contemporary Middle Eastern art into the limelight, has been named Fair Director of Art Dubai. She succeeds co-founder John Martin, who remains on the fair’s board.

Carver has been living in Dubai for the past eight years and is currently editor-at-large of Bidoun Magazine and director of Bidoun Projects. She has been a member of this renowned Middle Eastern arts organisation since its founding in 2004 and will remain on their board.

Antonia Carver at the 2009 Dubai International Film Festival. Taken from zimbio.com.

The fifth edition of Art Dubai takes place in March 2011, coinciding with Sharjah Biennial 10, and as quoted on ARTINFO,

Officials from the fair say that they plan to work closely with the Sharjah Biennale to raise the international awareness of artists from the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia as they expand into those regions. Recently there has been a surge in contemporary art in the Middle East, as wealthy locals have flocked to international and regional art fairs, snapping up works along the way.

So what changes, if any, does new Fair Director Antonia Carver aim to make to Art Dubai? As she points out in an interview with Time Out Dubai,

“Any fair is ultimately a place to do business, but Art Dubai is also one of the city’s premier cultural events. We’re continuing with the Global Art Forum and projects, as well as educational events, and there’s more to come. At the last fair I was the director of Bidoun Projects: we commissioned projects such as artist Daniel Bozhkov’s ‘World’s Fastest Tour of Art Dubai’. We want to continue with these types of events – they’re different to what other fairs do and they’re a way to help audiences interact with the work.”

She has a deep knowledge and understanding of Middle Eastern contemporary art although, as she states in a 2008 interview with ForYourArt, this is a term only recently coined:

“Dubai has – dramatically – established itself as a commercial art capital in the last 2-3 years. This has meant that for the first time, in commercial terms at least, it’s possible to refer to ‘Middle Eastern art,’ and compare this nascent market with India, China, Latin America, and so on.”

On the Middle Eastern art market she is quoted as saying in The Art Newspaper that…

“There’s never been such a level of international interest in the region and its art and culture. There is a new maturity in the market with a group of young Emirati and UAE-based collectors who are interested in how the market works and are looking at international as well as regional artists.”

Carver graduated in 1994 and since then has worked in publishing and the arts in Sydney, Australia and London. She was a correspondent for The Art Newspaper and has contributed to journals, newspapers and exhibition catalogues worldwide. As a film curator, she is a member of the programming teams for the Dubai International Film Festival and Edinburgh International Film Festival, specialising in Arab and Iranian cinema.

KN

Related Topics: Middle Eastern artists, events – fairs, art professionals

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Christies in Dubai sets record for most pricey Arab artwork

CONTEMPORARY MIDDLE EASTERN ART

DUBAI- Christies auctions Ahmed Mustafa's diptych "Remembrance and Gratitude" on October 24, 2009 for a record breaking $662,500.

A Christies auction in Dubai set a new record for the price of a contemporary Arab artwork, fetching $662,500 for a double calligraphy piece by Egyptian artist Ahmed Mustafa titled “Remembrance and Gratitude.” Matoob Business reports Mustafa already held the record for the highest selling Arab artwork, and broke his own auction sales record set with a different artwork in 2007.

Christies not surprised

The record breaking sale was little surprise to Christies, however. The Daily Star reveals Christies had given the work the highest-ever guide price, valuing Mustafa’s diptych at $600,000-$800,000. Christies Middle East and Europe president Jussi Phylkkanen notes:

“Expectations were high, especially with regards to the exhibited works of exceptional quality”

Other high sellers

The second highest selling artwork at $578,500 dollars was “Untitled (Yellow Heads)” painting by India’s Tyeb Metha. Turkish artist Burhan Dogancay’s “Rift” sold for $242,500, and Iranian Charles Hossein Zenderoudi’s “Kharjee Spirit” fetched $218,500 dollars.

Middle Eastern market shows growth

The October 24th auction in total sold 6.7 million dollars worth of artworks, twice the value reached in the last auction that was held in April. The October sale was being viewed by experts as a test for the Middle Eastern art market, which has struggled in the recession as the mega rich expressed less interest in purchasing artworks.

Regarding the sale, AFP reports that Michael Jeha, Christies Middle East managing director commented:

“Despite the global economic crisis… the appetite for art in the Middle East continues to grow, and also the appetite for Middle Eastern arts.”

Jeha continued by saying that since the first auction in 2006, Christies sales in Dubai have risen by 400%.

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India has the most speculative art market in the world says Philip Hoffman, The Fine Art Fund – Business Standard

INDIAN ART FOR FUND

“Hoffman is something of a poster boy for art funds, and for the entire “art as an alternative asset class” discourse, doing annual trade of $120-130 million every year through the five funds he manages” says Business Standard. Fine Art Fund I – the first of these that he announced in 2003 to invest in museum quality art – is the longest-running and most successful art fund globally, having announced last year an average annualised returns on assets sold of 44 per cent. 

Indian Fine Art Fund established 2008

Earlier this year he established a $25 million Indian Fine Art Fund which explains Hoffman’s presence at the India’s first art fair, The Indian Art Summit held August 2008 and “the buzz of excitement that follows his tall, brown-suited figure as he goes around the stalls, jotting down notes in his little notepad”. He made some investments, not very huge, but which artists and how much he does not reveal. “I was reviewing some of the works we bought six months ago,” he says, sipping his coffee in a very businesslike fashion. “They’re up 50 per cent and these are only mid-auction estimates. But then it is not unusual in these markets to make 100 per cent, 200 per cent, or even 300 per cent returns. But we are not buying emerging artists at $2,000 or $1,000. It’s a very risky game at that stage.”

The India fund has managed to attract around a hundred investors, mostly “cash-rich European individuals and a few London hedge funders managers”, Hoffman reveals, even though SEBI’s regulatory guidelines on investment in art funds did discourage some Indian banks from investing in the fund. “I think some of the Indian art is great. But you know my reputation is that quite often I’ll spend less than 30 seconds looking at a work of art on which we will spend $ 3 million.” The decision to buy or not to buy, Hoffman says, is made by 30 professionals – “who between them have 400 years of expertise”.

Indian market speculative

Hoffman marvels at the what he calls the “entrepreneurial” spirit of Indian consumers of art. “Of all the art markets in the world, this one is the most speculative. India has the most art funds in the world. If there is a market and money to be made, you guys are very fast at it, faster than the rest of the world.”  It might be wonderful but it also leads to instability, Hoffman seems to imply, because there are few serious collectors and more of those who “buy now only to sell on the way home”.

Lack of institutions a problem

The problem is also one of the lack of institutions to widen interest and cultivate tastes in art. “Unlike in New York, where curators have decided that Picasso is important or London where taste-makers have decided Rembrandt and Titian are going to be there until posterity, in India the names are constantly changing. Yes, five to seven names are constantly mentioned but there’s no unanimity,” he says draining the last of the coffee. “Look at the Middle East,” Hoffman says, “where Abu Dhabi is coming up with a cultural centre that’ll cost $30 billion. Imagine how much their curatorial direction will influence the market when that centre is up?” Indeed, more than China or India, Hoffman seems upbeat about the prospects of Middle East art, not the least because unlike the other art markets, “it is still mostly people from the Middle East who are investing in Middle Eastern art”.

But don’t lose heart says the Business Standard- “In the long term, India is a one-way horse,” Hoffman predicts. “It has a long way to go.”

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Iranian art market booms for younger artists – Artprice

Farhad Moshiri Eshgh

 

 

IRANIAN ART MARKET

“The vitality of the Middle-Eastern market is giving a number of young Iranian artists a healthy price index on the secondary art market” says Artprice’s online magazine Art Market Insight.

In October 2007, at only his second auction appearance, Christie’s Dubai generated a bid of $50,000 for a painting by Afshin PIRHASHEMI (born 1974) entitled Those Four Days.  Just a month earlier in Paris, Artcurial sold his painting Memory for 6,000 euros and by  April 2008 his triptych ‘Lonely’ created in 2005 commanded an astounding price of $110,000 at Christie’s in Dubai.

The work of two young Iranian women are beginning to command attention: Shirin ALIABADI and Shadi GHADIRIAN (born in 1973 and 1974 respectively) create works inspired by the challenges facing women. Shadi Ghadirian’s photos show veiled women with contemporary objects and her most famous piece, Stereo, sold for £9,000 (over $18,000) in 2007 at Sotheby’s in London.

Stimulated by developments in the art market infrastucture including the introduction of art fair, Art Dubai in 2007 and the appearance of auction houses (Christies 2006, Bonhams 2008), contemporary artists from Tunisia, Egypt, Morocco, Lebanon and Iran have seen increasing attention and price inflation.

'Iranian Contemporary Art' by Rose Issa - click to buy book

Shirin Neshat

and Farhad Moshiri are two artists who are now well known on the international art scene. Farhad Moshiri became the highest selling Iranian artist when his 2 metre high bronze work ‘The Wall (Oh Persepolis)’ fetched no less than $2.5 million at Christies Dubai in April 2008 trouncing its estimate of $400,000-600,000. Farhah Moshiri is best known for his jewel art pieces in which he covers objects or makes images with fine layers of gold or Swarowski crystals.

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• full story on Artprice site
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