Sundaram Tagore: Friendship as a Curatorial Principle

Sundaram Tagore, founder of the Sundaram Tagore Gallery, attributes his international success to friendships rather than market trends. Born in 1961 into a culturally influential Indian family, he grew up near Jorasanko Thakur Bari, the ancestral home in Kolkata, and later lived in Santiniketan and Delhi. His great-granduncle, Rabindranath Tagore, was a poet, educator, and painter who became the first Asian Nobel laureate in Literature in 1913. Tagore founded his eponymous gallery in 2000, which now operates spaces in New York, Singapore, and London. Beyond the gallery, he is a writer, scholar, collector, and filmmaker. He states, "Art is wealth we must share," and emphasizes that his mission for 25 years has been to find artists and share them with the world. He follows instinct and friendships, not the market. His belief in friendship as a carrier of art predates his gallery career, rooted in his family's legacy. The article highlights his holistic approach to art, blending personal connections with professional endeavors.