Varanasi’s ghats look incandescent through the brush strokes of prolific painter Paresh Maity. The smallest of details are captured with luminous intensity in his larger than life canvases on display at the Bikaner House in Delhi. The spectacular exhibition also marks the 25th anniversary of Sunaina Anand’s Art Alive Gallery which has had a long association with Maity.
Anand is just one of the many women gallery owners who have made Delhi’s art scene throb with life and helped fetch artists handsome commissions. A few months ago at Bikaner House, Renu Modi celebrated 35 years of her Gallery Espace with a nostalgic exhibition called Memory Fields featuring art works by M F Husain, Manjit Bawa among others.
Besides Anand and Modi, there is Bhavna Kakar’s Latitude 28 celebrating its 15th year that started with the intention of breaking the white cube mould and making the gallery a space for dialogue and experimentation. Then there is Pooja Sood’s Khoj Studios, which is a radical space for alternative art. Roshni Vadehra leads one of Delhi’s oldest art galleries, founded by her father.
And, of course, there is the formidable queen bee of art patronage Kiran Nadar whose KNMA galleries in Saket and Noida have made globally renowned works accessible to the general public. For instance, last year KNMA showed Caravaggio’s rediscovered 400-year old Baroque masterpiece Mary Magdalene in Ecstasy — a truly memorable experience for art lovers.
Curated Value
It’s not easy to run an art gallery. As Anand said, “There are no short-term gains in this field. There are challenges in running an art gallery especially when you want to position your gallery as a strong cultural institution and not just a place to buy and sell art. You have to be very sure about your Gallery’s vision and select artists whose art practices align with that programming.” She added that, “Legal procedures pertaining to sales and logistics also pose challenges.”
“One of the biggest challenges is the unpredictability of the art market,” points out Kakar,as she explains, “Running a gallery can be profitable, but it is rarely a straightforward commercial enterprise.”
“Most galleries operate at the intersection of culture, patronage, and business, and profitability often depends on a combination of sales, relationships, programming, and long-term reputation,” she added.
Changing landscape
But the good news is that the art landscape is changing. Modi said when she opened her art gallery in 1989, there were only a handful of collectors buying art. “There are many more collectors now, and they are much younger –in their 40sand 50s, or even younger. Awareness levels have risen manifold whether because of social media, or the many art fairs and biennales that have started recently. People building new homes now work with their architects and interior designers to source and display art. Even corporates are buying or commissioning art for their offices,” she added.
Kakar describes how galleries today are also expanding their role beyond exhibitions — through publications, residencies, talks, performances, and collaborations with museums and cultural institutions. “Ultimately, the sustainability of a gallery often lies in its ability to build trust, its long term vision — with artists, collectors, and the wider cultural community. When that ecosystem is strong, financial stability tends to follow, even if profitability is rarely the sole motivation for running a gallery,” she added.
Published on March 7, 2026