Two paintings by Shilpacharya Zainul Abedin were sold at record prices at an auction in New York recently. Among them, the ‘Santal Couple’ painting is said to have been sold for 381 thousand US dollars.
Art pundits say this is the record for the highest price for a work by a Bangladeshi artist sold at auction. Another painting by Zainul Abedin sold at auction is an oil painting of a seated woman.
Last week famous art auction company Sodeby’s organized an auction titled ‘Modern and Contemporary South Asian Art’ in New York. Zainul Abedin’s two paintings were sold there on March 18.
According to the information given on Sodeby’s website, the ‘Santal couple’ painting was sold at the auction for 381,000 dollars, which is 4.17 million and 6.5 thousand taka in Bangladeshi currency.
At the auction, the price of this picture was estimated at 1 lakh to 1.5 lakh US dollars.
Art experts say that these two paintings are among the highest selling paintings of Zainul Abedin.
What is known about the two paintings
In Zainul Abedin’s painting ‘Santal Couple’, a couple is seen walking barefoot wearing Mathal, a type of rural hat made of bamboo or cane.
The picture was painted by Zainul Abedin in 1963. His name is signed above the painting. This oil on canvas painting measures 102 cm in width and 135.5 cm in length.
The information on Sodeby’s website says that the painting is by Jamshed K. Marker and Diana J. was in Marker’s family collection.
The source of the painting is stated to be Jamshed K. directly from the artist in 1963. Marker and Diana J. Marker got it.
Both of them were close friends of Zainul Abedin.
The artist often visited the house of the Marker couple and at that time introduced several famous artists of South Asia including the artist Rashid Chowdhury to the Marker couple.
Sodeby’s put the base price of this painting at one to one and a half million US dollars.
However, there is no information on Sodeby’s website about who bought this painting.
Earlier in 2018, another painting from the Santal series by Zainul Abedin was sold for 1.5 crore in Bangladeshi currency at Christie’s in New York.
In the second painting, Shilpacharya Zainul Abedin painted a woman. On it sits a tired woman wearing a red bangle and an azure blue sari.
The picture was painted in oil on board between 1956 and 1963. Its length is 80.4 centimeters and width is a little over 60.4 centimeters.
It was also in the family collection of the Marker couple, which was sold on March 19.
According to Sodeby’s website, this painting was priced between 80,000 and 120,000 US dollars. In Bangladeshi currency that is 88 lakh to 1 crore 32 lakh taka.
But it ended up selling for more than three times the price. That is, its price has risen to two lakh 79 thousand 400 US dollars or a little more than three crore six lakh taka.
Sodeby’s did not say anything about the buyer of this painting.
Source: BBC Bangla
