The art community is quite small and most of the times things are running well, until a ripple shows and exposes dark secrets that plague the community. Take for instance the case of art gallery owner T. Hanumantha Rao and Bengali artist Payel Sarkar Biplab.
Earlier this week, Payel, in a lengthy Facebook post, alleged that the gallery owner cheated her. “Bellow the three paintings are mine and you didn’t return me (sic) according your promise... You don’t have respect for your words... You supposed to return my paintings. I didn’t gifted you my paintings but you are keen to keep my paintings to earn money. If you already earned then celebrate your birthday with my money. Cos when I was physically unwell and asked for my money you gave me indecent proposal on my Birthday as an ugly gift (sic),” read her post. She also wrote, “Don’t threat me in my inbox that you will write about me on your facebook wall.... when I asked you to return my paintings according to your promise you made indecent proposals. I protested then you asked for money and gave me condition to go to Hyderabad to visit you in a hotel at night... you even gave me... I respect my self, I am saying the truth and I am not afraid of you... (sic).”
Rao says he is innocent. “I have done nothing wrong,” he says, adding, “I met Payel a year-and a-half ago. She was part of a group art show that I hosted. After the show, I asked her to take back her paintings but she refused, because she thought buyers would check her work. But no one bought them. She called me two months ago and asked for her paintings, but I couldn’t send them as my father had passed away and I was in my village. But I have sent her works back now. All these allegations of making money out of her works are not true and are baseless.” He also showed the delivery receipt.
Kaali Sudheer, art gallery owner from Hyderabad says, “It’s a common practice that the owner keeps the work after a show for at least a year, so that if any buyer picks up the work, the owner too gets a commission. Otherwise, the gallery will suffer a loss as the buyer can go directly to the artist and pick up the work. After all, the owner has invested money in the show and the artist.” He adds that once he even had to intervene between a gallery owner in Delhi and a local artist, because the gallery sold the artist’s work, but never paid them. A famous gallery owner from Hyderabad says, “We had an art piece for a while, but after a while the artist demanded the work back and so we sent it. Later I found that a buyer had bought the work directly from the artist, this is not fair as we put together the show and invest money.”
Another owner says, “Buyers need to be educated. When they pay the gallery owner for an artwork, they are supposed to receive a certificate. The certificate should be with the artist and whenever a payment goes through, the artist should send across the certificate. This way the buyer gets proof of the work and the artist knows that his work is being sold.” We couldn’t get in touch with Payel Sarkar.
