In Mumbai, growth is the only constant. Along with an expressway being built across the entire coast and reclaimed land being dug up for an ever-delayed metro project, there are so many ongoing construction sites in the financial capital that it periodically ranks as having some of the most polluted air in the world. Those who can afford it retreat into air-conditioned, purified bubbles, overlooking a distant view of the gnawing haze. 

As a sliver of the city’s upper class begins moving into newly built homes, even larger than those they previously occupied, residents procure more walls to fill and higher aspirations to meet. Accordingly, Mumbai’s real estate boom has brought an onslaught of interior decorators and their clients into commercial art galleries in search of works that can serve as both decoration and financial investments. In fact, there are so many new buyers, gallerists admit that they no longer know them all. Yet unlike previous clients, few return as collectors once their homes have been furnished.