LONDON.- A rare self-portrait by the pioneering Indian modernist painter Amrita Sher-Gil leads Sotheby’s auction of Modern and Contemporary South Asian Art in London on 6 October 2015. Untitled (Self-Portrait), 1931 (est. £1.5–2 million) will be one of the highlights of Indian and Islamic Art Week in London, a programme of exhibitions, events and auctions running from 2 to 7 October, which also includes the single-owner sale of The Sven Gahlin Collection on 6 October and Arts of the Islamic World on 7 October.

Sher-Gil is considered among the most important Indian painters of the 20th century and essentially the mother of Modern Indian art. With 95 of the 174 documented works created over the course her brief career (Sher-Gil died in 1941 aged 28) held in the collection of the National Gallery of Modern Art, India, few works ever appear at auction. Like her Mexican peer Frida Kahlo, with whom she shares Hungarian heritage, Sher-Gil was a rebellious and adventurous spirit who broke barriers in art and life.

Discussing the painting, Yamini Mehta, International Head of Modern and Contemporary South Asian Art, said: “Amrita Sher-Gil was a pioneering figure in Indian art. As a National Treasure in India, it is rare for any work by the artist to appear at auction, so to be able to offer such an exceptionally important self-portrait at our London sale in October is a true privilege. This is one of her most romantic works as it was presented to her fellow artist and lover, Boris Taslitzky after it was painted in 1931 and has been in the hands of his family until now. The provenance is exceptional and it is one of less than a handful of works that are in private hands outside of India, thus making this the rarest of opportunities to acquire her work.”

Over the last twenty years there has been a dramatic change in the market for South Asian art, and as a result Sotheby’s has achieved record prices in recent sales. On 17 and 18 March 2015, Sotheby’s two sales of Indian Art in New York achieved the outstanding total of $16,632,875, led by another extraordinarily rare Untitled (Self portrait) by Amrita Sher-Gil which sold for $2,920,000 and established a new record for any Indian female artist.

Maqbool Fida Husain, The Sixth Seal (£600,000-800,000)
MF Husain’s The Sixth Seal exemplifies many of the artist’s most recognisable personal symbols and serves as a paean to Indian civilisation. It is a work that builds upon the themes of Zameen 1955, Husain’s celebrated opus currently housed in the National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi. In this work from 1964, the traditional forms of ancient Indian sculpture, miniature painting, dance and folk art are depicted in vignettes. This painting is made even more notable by virtue that it was previously in the collection of Chester and Davida Herwitz, who were among of the biggest patrons and collectors of Modern Indian art in the 20th century.

Sayed Haider Raza, Bhartiya Samaroh, 1988 (£500,000-700,000)
Throughout his career Raza has been influenced by the mystical power of nature. The elements and the potency of colours are central to the evolution of Raza's artistic vocabulary. Bharatiya Samaroh from 1988 is an extraordinary example of the artist’s signature meditations on the bindu. Composed of 33 squares which form a matrix of interrelating abstract and geometric elements, and a large an imposing black bindu, this work was featured on the front cover of the artist’s 2004 monograph, “Mandalas”.

Jogen Chowdhury, Untitled (Couple No. 1, Man and Woman), 1986 (£200,000-300,000)
Untitled (Couple No. 1, Man and Woman) demonstrates Chowdhury's appreciation of the Bengal “pat” tradition and his emphasis on autobiographical narrative. Chowdhury references local traditions and popular visual culture to comment on the complexities and contradictions of Bengali middle-class society. The artist combines fantasy with reality to produce figures that are often grotesque and distorted. “The sheer range of characters, temperaments and manners that I observed in the people that I saw around myself fascinated me. I portrayed them from an essentially personal perspective. In my characterisation of these people, I crossed the bounds of realistic representation and let imagination take over”, says Chowdhury.

Francis Newton Souza, Death and the Maiden, 1966 (£100,000-150,000)
Souza was fascinated with the female nude and frequently his depictions of couples are in the form of a monstrous male figure in erotic embrace with a young beautiful girl. In several erotic sketches, from roughly the same period as this work, Souza's male figures often appear as ghostlike shadows. It is therefore no surprise that the subject of Death and the Maiden would have held an appeal for him and offers the ideal art historical precedents to play with one of his favourite themes; that of the Beauty and the Beast.

Jehangir Sabavala, Intangible Menace (£60,000-80,000)
Jehangir Sabavala (1922-2011) was one of Bombay’s leading painters with a unique cubistic style depicting mythical landscapes, and solitary figures often dwarfed by the overpowering elements. Intangible Menace is an exceptional rendering of gathering storm clouds coming from the collection of Vijaya Laksmi Pandit (1900-1990). Pandit, the sister of India’s first Prime Minister, Jawarhal Nehru, Pandit was also a diplomat and politician in her own right who developed a friendship with the artist during her stint as governor of Maharashtra in the 1960s.