Prasanna Seth

As with the previous lot by Ambadas Khobragade, this untitled work by Prasanna Seth was one of Ute and Rolf Rettberg’s earliest acquisitions. It was acquired from Kekoo Gandhy of Chemould Gallery in 1967, when the Rettbergs had started to decorate their home at Juhu Beach, Bombay. Seth was an enigmatic artist, later moving to Canada, and apart from a selection of 1960s and 1970s works in the collection of the Jehangir Nicholson Art Foundation, few of his paintings are known. The current lot, a richly textured, brooding canvas from 1967, remained a treasured gem in the Rettberg collection for over fifty years, fondly referred to by Rolf as ‘Bombay at Night’.