From New York to Norway, Indian artists have found patrons around the world. We look at three collectors from Europe and America whose travels led them on an unusual journey of collecting. Paintings from their collections feature in our upcoming Evening Sale.

Carole Nimmo Bourne
New York
Owner of V S Gaitonde’s Untitled (1963)

Carole Nimmo Bourne (centre); V S Gaitonde, Untitled, 1963

Gaitonde’s enigmatic midnight blue canvas, the cover lot of the Evening Sale, is a masterpiece. It was painted in 1963, a year before the artist left for New York on a J D Rockefeller III Fellowship to live and work in the USA. The painting was once part of the collection of New York-based philanthropist Carole Nimmo Bourne. Bourne worked as an administrator with the Ford Foundation’s Population Program in the 1960s and ‘70s. Bourne also travelled extensively with her husband, Kenneth Barnes Bourne Jr. It is likely that she acquired the Gaitonde painting during her travels around the world.

Dirk and Hixe Angelroth
Austria
Owners of Ram Kumar’s Goa Landscape and Untitled (both 1976)

Dirk and Hixe Angelroth; Ram Kumar, Goa Landscape, 1976

Ram Kumar, Untitled, 1976

International, cosmopolitan world travellers, the Angelroths were introduced to Ram Kumar through their careers at the Goethe-Institut. From 1965 to 2002, the Angelroths fostered cultural relations between Germany and South Asia through the organisation’s branches in Chennai, Mumbai and Pune. They acquired Ram Kumar’s Goa Landscape (lot 59) and Untitled (lot 60), at a solo exhibition of the artist’s work in Mumbai in the 1970s. Both paintings have graced their home in Austria since retirement, and are now going on auction.

Nils Aage Paulsen
Norway
Owner of M F Husain’s Untitled (Woman with Elephant)

Nils Aage Paulsen; M F Husain, Untitled (Woman with Elephant)

Nils Aage Paulsen discovered M F Husain’s paintings when he was posted in New Delhi with the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation. Paulsen was a painter himself, and his eye for art kindled a passion for collecting African and Asian Art. He bought Husain’s Untitled (Woman with Elephant) following a visit to the former Gita Art Gallery in 1974, where it was on display. Paulsen took the painting with him when he returned to Oslo. The painting remained with him until his death in 1988, when it was bequeathed to his sister, Grethe Løvald. Following her death in 2002, Untitled (Woman with Elephant) remained within the family and enters the auction market for the first time.

For more collector stories, browse through our catalogue. The Evening Sale will take place in New Delhi on 21 September 2017.