London taxi driver's £40 Amritsar painting sold for £75,000 in 2016

A painting bought for just £40 at a car boot sale in Britain turned out to be a remarkable piece of Indian art nearly three decades later. According to Antiques Trade Gazette, which documented the discovery in its 50 Great Objects collection, the painting sold for £75,000, excluding the buyer’s premium, at Roseberys in London on April 15, 2016. Initially catalogued with a modest estimate of £500 to £1,000, the work attracted intense bidding after specialists identified its subject as the historic walled city of Amritsar, with the Golden Temple in the background. Its possible artist was also linked to the city’s 19th-century artistic tradition.A £40 purchase that remained unnoticed for decadesThe painting belonged to a London taxi driver who had purchased it at a car boot sale around 30 years before the auction. The seller had initially asked £60, but the driver negotiated the price down to £40.