Top-100 artists:
We use our proprietary AI - LiveArt Estimate™ to calculate current market value for each artwork. Based on this data LiveArt is able to provide numerous insights into artist and artwork financial performance, including:
See the measure of artist investment performance relative to risk. A higher ratio suggests better risk-adjusted returns, indicating more consistent performance with less risk.
Explore the most prolific periods in an artist's career based on artwork production volume and current market value. It also segments these periods by category, offering insights into when the most valuable pieces were created in each category.
Free to sign up. No credit card required.
| Image | Sale date | Auction house | Location | Sale name | Lot No. | Estimate | Price Sold | Condition | Title |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
May 26, 2016 | Christie's | London | South Asian Modern + Contemporary Art | 32 | $****** - ****** | Ciel Blue |
paintings
81 x 65.1 cm (31.88 x 25.63 in)
oil on canvas
signed and dated 'RAZA '60' (upper right); further twice signed and dated and inscribed "RAZA P_296 '60 / "Ciel Blue" / 25 F. / à Myran Israel / en amicat souvenir- / RAZA / Aut 1960' (on the reverse); further titled and inscribed " CIEL BLUE / by SAYED HAIDER RAZA / NO 825' (on Galerie Dresdnere label on the reverse)
Galerie Lara Vincy, Paris
Galerie Dresdnere, Montreal
Gift from the artist to Myron J. Israel, Montreal
This painting comes directly from the family collection of the Canadian gallerists, Myron Israel and Simon Dresdnere, who exhibited Raza's works between 1958 and 1968. Israel and Dresdnere had a close relationship with Raza's Paris dealer, Lara Vincy, and exhibited the work of several artists she represented at their galleries in Montreal and Toronto.
Thence by descent
After moving to France in 1950, Syed Haider Raza immersed himself in the currents of Western Modernism, first experimenting with Post-Impressionism, then moving towards greater abstraction and eventually incorporating the geometric elements of Neo-Tantrism derived from ancient Indian texts in his work. While his contemporaries like F.N. Souza and M.F. Husain dealt primarily with figural subjects, Raza chose to focus on nature and the landscape throughout his career.<br>Yashodhara Dalmia describes Raza’s first few days in Paris, “He could hardly wait to get to the Jeu de Paume the next day, where he stood transfixed in front of works by Van Gogh and especially Cezanne, ‘which restored me to tranquillity with their straight lines’. For the next fifteen years, Raza was to work doggedly, persistently, with great strength and determination, inspired primarily by the formal construction of Cezanne and the passionate exploration of colour by Van Gogh. His medium changed from gouache in tempera to impasto in oil. Signifying a major breakthrough with the paint coming into its own. He moved out to the countryside; to Cezanne’s Provence, as a matter of fact, and to the Maritime Alps where the French landscape with its trees, mountains, villages, and churches became his staple diet.” (Y. Dalmia, ‘Journeys with the Black Sun’, Understanding Raza, New Delhi, 2013, p. 46)<br>Raza’s landscapes of the late 1950s and early 1960s were largely inspired by the rolling vistas and village architecture of rural France, which he encountered on his travels around the country. While the subject matter in these paintings is still recognisable, colour and painterly application become the key elements of the compositions. In Ciel Bleu a small, dense village represented by a group of colliding rooftops peeks out under the deep blue of the night sky. A riot of red, orange and green foliage cascades down a hillside below the village. As exemplified in this painting, Raza relies on a vivid palette and heavy texture as stylistic devices to communicate an emotional rather than visual experience of the scene.<br>
