How the market prices a Raza canvas, what is publicly documented, and the checks to make before you buy, sell or insure one.
ArtValue compares your work with public auction results and market data. Its coverage of the Indian auction houses (Saffronart, AstaGuru, Pundole's) is limited, so for this market treat the estimate as a first orientation, not as a price or an authentication.
Period. Raza co-founded the Progressive Artists' Group in Bombay in 1947 and lived in France from 1950 until he returned to India in 2010. His early work consists mainly of landscapes; from around 1980 the bindu (a point or dot) becomes the centre of his geometric, colour-saturated compositions. The market distinguishes clearly between these phases, and the large, resolved late-1970s to 1990s canvases are the most sought after.
Medium and format. Oil and acrylic on canvas sit well above works on paper (gouache, watercolour, ink), and large square canvases above small ones. Editions (serigraphs and other prints) are a different, much lower market and are among the objects most often confused with originals.
Quality and condition. Within a period, the strength of the composition, the saturation of the colour and the state of the surface decide the price.
Three works, three houses, three currencies: this is why a Raza price quoted without its date, house and currency is not usable. Prices are as reported, usually including the buyer's premium. 1 crore = 10 million rupees. Isolated results are not a valuation of your work: price depends on period, medium, size, quality and provenance, and sale records move over time.
Forgeries of leading Indian modernists are a documented problem. Examples: in January 2009 S. H. Raza opened an exhibition of his work in Delhi and publicly said that most of the roughly 30 paintings on show were not by him; the show was cancelled the same day (ArtDaily/Artron, 20 January 2009). In September 2025 India's Enforcement Directorate filed a charge sheet before a special court in Mumbai alleging that 11 fake paintings had been sold as works by Husain, Raza, Manjit Bawa and Souza for about Rs 17.9 crore (The Week (PTI), 24 September 2025). These are allegations and cases, not a statement about any particular work.
India's Antiquities and Art Treasures Act, 1972 makes it unlawful for anyone other than the Central Government, or an authority or agency it has authorised, to export an "antiquity" or an "art treasure" (section 3). Exporting or attempting to export one is punishable by imprisonment of six months to three years and a fine (section 25). An "art treasure" is a work of art that the Central Government has declared as such by notification, and no such declaration can be made while the artist is alive. Source: Antiquities and Art Treasures Act, 1972 (text).
Works by nine deceased artists were declared national art treasures by Central Government notifications of 1976 and 1979, the so-called "Navaratna": Abanindranath Tagore, Gaganendranath Tagore, Rabindranath Tagore, Amrita Sher-Gil, Nandalal Bose, Jamini Roy, Raja Ravi Varma, Nicholas Roerich and Sailoz Mookherjea (Khaitan & Co, Chambers Art & Cultural Property Law 2025, India). S. H. Raza is not among those nine, according to the sources below. The Government can still declare further works by deceased artists, so check the current notifications and take legal advice before exporting a major work.
Other rules can apply as well (customs and import duties in the destination country, cultural property rules, taxes). This is general information, not legal advice.
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