PARTNERS IN LIFE AND ART

Looking back at many years of togetherness, three power couples in the Indian art world who have built their legacy from the ground up talk common passions, slow romance, and the evolving processes of creative exchange

- NIDA NAEEM

Minal and Dinesh Vazirani

"If you put us in a room with a collection of paintings, we always choose the same one," laugh Dinesh and Minal Vazirani. The couple invested in their very first artwork during their honeymoon, in 1994. The piece, made by a Balinese painter, represented the beginning of a lifelong journey of collecting art, and helping others access art that they want to invest in. Six years later, they established Saffronart, the country's first online art auction house, and partly catalysed the Indian Art Boom of the noughties. 

We rewind a bit, and it's revealed that the two met at a Thanksgiving dinner in San Francisco. "Dinesh was studying art and design, while I was also studying art history. We kept in touch, and a year and a half later, we decided to get married," shares Minal. This was followed by the Vaziranis' relocation back to Mumbai. Minal adds, "When you live in a place that has a 5,000-year-old aesthetic history, you cannot help but be drawn to it." It is this rich visual culture that the duo took to the rest of the world, especially in the initial days of Saffronart.

"We did a lot of shows in New York, London, Hong Kong, etc., because the internet penetration there was better. And the NRIs wanted to buy Indian art because it was like a cultural bridge for them. One of the reasons we focused on the international market was that it was well-suited for a transparent model," explains Dinesh.

Saffronart was one the first auction houses to openly publish prices online. The Vaziranis' own experiences purchasing art and being unsure about the pricing led them to this choice. "The other issue was accessibility.