MF Hussain’s 14-foot-long painting, Gram Yatra, remains one of his best artworks, both in vision and scale. With a record sale, it became the most expensive India artwork to have ever sold.
MF Hussain and his 1954 painting Gram Yatra
MF Hussain, a name synonymous with art, innovation and bold vision who painted India’s myths, streets and emotions with fearless intensity. Unapologetic and bold, his artworks captured a modern vision of contemporary narratives that hold relevance even today. Though each artwork has painted a different side of India earning global appeal, one of his artworks has been especially famous for its record price at an auction.
The 14-foot-long painting, pivotal in vision, captured the pulse of rural India with unshakeable confidence and fearless expression. Known as Gram Yatra, the work was sold for an astounding $13.8 million (around Rs 115 crore) in New York, becoming the most expensive Indian painting ever sold at auction. But the question now arise, who is the buyer?
Who bought MF Hussain’s most expensive painting?
Whereas the auction house kept the information discreet, various reports by art industry insiders point to the buyer being Kiran Nadar, wife of billionaire Shiv Nadar, founder of the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA), India’s first private museum focused on modern and contemporary art, who bought the masterpiece for her museum. One of India’s most influential art patrons, Kiran Nadar shared her view on art as being a public good and not as a private asset. Speaking with Financial Express, she had said, “Art must be appreciated daily, not locked away as an investment.”
The purchase, if done by her, does not only make it a historic and record-breaking but a cultural turning point with long-term consequences for the valuation, preservation and global perception of Indian art.
All about the painting
A 1954 painting, Gram Yatra marks his initial years as a professional painter, he started painting in the late 1930s, but one of his most ambitious and gigantic work. The artwork came at a time when India still struggling to learn about its newfound identity as an independent country.
What separates this work from his other expressions is its connect with deeper reality, quietness and a wider view of the real rural India. Whereas his later works have more references from mythology along with bold abstracts.
Gram Yatra, as the name suggests, depicts rural life in a sequence of 13 interconnected panels. The elements include, farmers, women, animals, village rituals, moments of labour and rest. What attracts viewers is its simplicity woven in a complex environment of struggles and daily life. No premise, no hero, no drama, rural life in its rawness.
The painting traces the journey, justifying its title, and shows India in a deep lense, not dramatised or exaggerated. According to Art historians, this phase of Husain’s work was among his most sincere and socially rooted time. The scope of Gram Yatra is even more unique. It is not just a single painting depicting a point but a whole archive, a mural that preserves a fading way of life.
