Welcome to October, the equivalent to a full moon for North American sports fans. With the NFL, college football, and Major League Soccer seasons in full swing, ice hockey and basketball return this month while baseball and the WNBA are in playoff mode. Any given night or afternoon features something engrossing to watch.

With that comes an onslaught of dealmaking. Scoreboard hears that the first round of the sale of the reigning NBA champion Boston Celtics got under way this week, with banks reaching out to and engaging with interested individual bidders. (The Celtics, meanwhile, open their 2024-25 pre-season with exhibitions in Abu Dhabi this weekend.) And weeks after the NFL formally approved institutional investment in teams, the Miami Dolphins are in talks to sell a minority stake to private equity firm Ares. Stay tuned on both of these deals and more, and meanwhile we have dispatches on LVMH’s continued sports push and the race for the next president of the International Olympic Committee. Do read on — Sara Germano, US sports business correspondent

Formula One bags LVMH as new top sponsor

That victorious F1 drivers currently spray Italian spumante over each other rather than actual champagne has been something of a running joke. Made with Chardonnay grapes grown in the Italian Alps, Ferrari Trentodoc may have a very motorsport name, but still lacks a certain je ne sais quoi on the podium.

That looks set to change after F1 signed up French luxury behemoth LVMH as a new global partner from next year. The 10-year deal is worth more than $1bn, and will involve several of the company’s high-end brands, which include fashion labels Louis Vuitton and Dior, jewellery brand Tiffany & Co, and Benefit Cosmetics. LVMH will become F1’s top sponsor by annual spend.

The most obvious starting point will be for LVHM’s Tag Heuer brand to replace Rolex as F1’s timepiece partner. Rolex has been tied to F1 since 2013, but its 11-year deal is about to run out. Tag Heuer has long fostered links to F1 through individual sponsorships, such as with drivers Max Verstappen, Daniel Ricciardo, Lewis Hamilton and even the late Ayrton Senna.

As for French bubbles, LVMH has plenty of options to pick from, including Dom Pérignon, Moët & Chandon, Veuve Clicquot and Ruinart. Which one LVMH executives go for may tell us more about who they see as the F1/LVMH crossover audience.

LVMH’s foray into motorsport has long been in the works, but its firm commitment to F1 comes hot on the heels of its lauded debut at the Paris 2024 Olympics.

For F1, landing such a big sponsor is evidence that it is still reaping the financial rewards of the growing US and female fan base brought to the sport by Netflix show Drive to Survive. According to earnings from F1 owner Liberty Media, sponsorship accounted for 18 per cent of the sport’s revenue in 2023, so around $580mn; this deal suggests there is still plenty of room for growth.

More broadly for sport, it offers hope to those who believe that big brand sponsorships can help pick up some of the slack as the media rights boom tapers off.

After Paris, a new Olympic race gets under way

Barely two months after the successful Paris Olympics, the games have a new contest ahead of them: the selection of the next president of the International Olympic Committee.

With current leader Thomas Bach set to complete his term limit of twelve years next spring, the candidates to succeed him include World Athletics chief Lord Sebastian Coe, the son of former president Juan Antonio Samaranch, Zimbabwean swimming champion Kirsty Coventry, Prince Feisal al-Hussein of Jordan, among others. The election is set to take place in Greece in March, preceded by presentations from each of the candidates in January.

At stake is an Olympic movement steadying itself amid global political and economic instability. Since Bach’s tenure began in late 2013, the IOC has shifted from its bullish push into new geographies, such as the 2016 Rio de Janeiro games, to a more conservative approach favouring recycled host cities (Los Angeles, Salt Lake City) and sustainability (tap water and public transit-reliant Paris). Through this period, Bach has sought to make the Olympics a distinguished advocate for political refugees, while also staging games through the help of authoritarian leadership in Sochi and Beijing.

“If we start taking parts as an organisation saying ‘this country’s human rights record I don’t like’ or ‘this other country is guilty in this war’, we will disappear” said Samaranch Junior of Spain in an interview about his candidacy with Reuters. He also proposed moving summer Olympics to winter months if global warming makes such events unfeasible.

The younger Samaranch’s father served as IOC president from 1980-2000 and developed the lucrative advertising scheme, known as TOP, which turned the games profitable. In recent years, a clique of Asia-based corporates signed on for sponsorship to cover the 2018-2022 stretch of three straight regional games in Pyeongchang, Tokyo, and Beijing; this week Bridgestone Tires joined fellow Japanese brands Toyota and Panasonic in opting not to renew with the IOC.

Other candidates are still forming their public message. Coe, the current World Athletics president and two-time Olympic champion, has said on his personal social media that he will release “a detailed manifesto” in the coming weeks. Kirsty Coventry, who would become the first woman and first African IOC president if elected, emphasised recent efforts by the Olympics to reach gender parity. Unlike other political elections this year — this one is just warming up.

Highlights

• Fifa’s rules on the transfers of professional footballers break EU rules on free movement, Brussels’ top court said, in a ruling that could disrupt the European game’s system of player sales between clubs. The ECJ’s verdict came as a result of a case brought by Lassana Diarra, a former French international player.

• The world’s top ranked men’s tennis player Jannik Sinner could be banned for up to two years after the World Anti-Doping Agency challenged an earlier decision by an independent panel to clear the Italian of any wrongdoing after he tested positive for a banned substance in March. Sinner said he was “surprised” and “very disappointed” by Wada’s decision to take the case to the Court of Arbitration in Sport.

• Nike withdrew its guidance for its fiscal 2025, which began in June, as sales and profits continue to decline and the world’s largest sportswear maker prepares for a CEO transition this month.

• GMR Group, part-owner of the Delhi Capitals Indian Premier League team, has acquired Hampshire County Cricket Club, making it the first English side to become foreign owned. GMR, an energy and infrastructure conglomerate, also has investments in crickets teams in Dubai, Pretoria and Seattle.

• Renault will cease making Formula One engines at the end of next year. Alpine, the F1 team part-owned by the French carmaker, could instead turn to Mercedes to supply its future power unit.

• Youth sports are not immune to the forces of commercialisation, and are now estimated to be a $30bn-$40bn per year industry. Private equity investment is now threatening to make Little League — baseball for tykes — too expensive for the average US family.

Chart of the week: Juve’s pain

Italian football club Juventus, which has a public listing, posted another year of losses, after failing to qualify for European football last season. That alone pushed revenue for the 2023-34 season down by €76mn compared to the previous year, while losses widened to €199mn after tax. The club has not made a profit since 2017, while cumulative losses over the past six seasons are now just shy of €900mn.

However, the club, owned by the Agnelli family, gave a more upbeat outlook for the year ahead. Executives believe the return to the Champions League this season plus cost cuts will help the club break even this year, with the aim of returning to profit in 2026-27.

Final Call

The lengthy trailer for the Six Kings showcase depicts a gigantic clay Rafael Nadal, a floating wolf pack leader Novak Djokovic, and a lightning-struck Viking chieftain Holger Rune all pinging tennis balls to each other. It’s pretty weird.

What’s it all for? Well, according to Andy Murray it’s to promote “an exhibition tennis event that nobody cares about”. See for yourself.

A MAJOR UK banking app is down causing chaos for customers.

Scores of users rushed online to complain they were unable to access online banking services.

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The Royal Bank of Scotland said they were experiencing “connection issues”.

An online post reads: “We have been receiving reports that the online banking and mobile app are experiencing connection issues.

“We are currently looking into getting this resolved.

“Thanks so much for your patience. We’re sorry for any inconvenience. Please try again later.”

Customer trying to access their accounts online were met with a message telling them: “Some kind of error has occurred.”

The app advises several steps to resolve the issue including checking Wi-Fi and ensuring the latest version of the app is installed.

However the tech gremlin has caused upset with bank users as they vented their frustration online.

One said: “So frustrating when it’s a Saturday and no local branch is open.”

Another said: “RBS is definitely having issues. I can’t sign into online banking or the app.”

A third added: “Smashing… full morning away to s**t thanks to the RBS app.”

The Royal Bank of Scotland was asked for comment.

It comes just over a month after similar issues on the RBS online banking service.

More to follow…

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“Where there is energy and dynamism, there is a market,” says Henry Howard-Sneyd, longtime chair of Asian art at Sotheby’s and founding member of the Asian Art in London (AAL) event, which takes place at the end of this month. Howard-Sneyd is only too aware of the “constant flux and flow of the Asian art market”, as he puts it. He and his colleagues in London have witnessed waves of new buyers from Japan in the 1980s and ’90s and from China more recently, whose aggressive bidding peaked in 2015.

Tastes have changed and power has shifted to New York, Hong Kong, mainland China and Paris. Yet this autumn season offers a reinvigorated London scene, with world-class, museum-quality pieces again on offer in saleroom and gallery, in part thanks to a forthcoming EU law on artwork origins.

Iwona Tenzing, whose gallery Tenzing Asian Art is making its debut at the Frieze Masters art fair next week, cited not only the “unparalleled exposure to an international audience” as a reason to show at the fair but also uncertainties arising from a 2019 EU law restricting the importation of “non-European” art into the bloc, which is expected to become operational by June 2025. Briefly, this requires proof that an object more than 200 years old and valued in excess of €18,000 was legally exported from the country of origin (itself not necessarily easy to determine, given changing geographical borders).

For works of art that left those countries centuries or even a few decades ago, this may prove an impossible paperchase. A theoretically laudable law aiming to restrict the illicit trade in cultural property is likely to have a profound effect on collectors, dealers and auction houses, and give London, which has lost ground to Paris, a distinct advantage now that it is outside the EU.

Tenzing, which has galleries in San Francisco and Hong Kong, will unveil a Tibetan thangka (scroll painting in distemper and gold on cloth) of the Buddha Vairocana dating to the late 12th or early 13th centuries, described as one of the rarest and most significant surviving examples of the period and priced at several million dollars.

Asian art has always been shown at Frieze Masters, but the arrival of the veteran Chinese art specialist Gisèle Croës in 2018 proved a game-changer. As a member of the fair’s selection committee, she argued for a more global representation of art and for an expansion of its range of older art, Croës explains from her Brussels gallery. At her suggestion, New York dealer Carlton Rochell joined the fray, contributing outstanding Buddhist and Hindu sculpture — Khmer, Indian and Gandharan. Last year, another New York dealer, Japanese specialists Thomsen Gallery, arrived; Erik Thomsen reported sales of several important works. This year, Thomsen’s folding screens and scroll paintings will be complemented by gold lacquer boxes, medieval stoneware jars and ikebana baskets.

Croës’s own stand also reflects Frieze Masters’ expansion into the realm of the more traditional antiques fair. Lined with late 18th- or early 19th-century Chinese wallpaper panels, she has created the “salon of a collector”, with lacquer furniture, imperial champlevé enamel garden stools — thought to have belonged to Marcel Proust — and bejewelled silver and silver gilt jardinieres (prices €40,000-€350,000).

Hong Kong/London-based newcomer Rossi & Rossi is presenting painters from the postwar Bombay Progressive Artists’ Group. Gana Art joins three existing gallerists from Seoul, presenting a solo show of Kim Kulim, a central figure of the Korean avant-garde. Shibunkaku of Kyoto presents postwar Japanese calligraphy, paintings and ceramics.

As Howard-Sneyd points out, this emphasis on Modern and contemporary ceramics, painting and printmaking in the broad London scene marks one of the biggest shifts in taste since the launch of AAL in 1998. The first of such citywide initiatives bringing together specialist galleries, auction houses and museums, the event reflects unusually close collaboration between the art trade this year: the leading auction houses are giving space in their showrooms to visiting commercial galleries and private dealers for the first time.

Three main ground-floor spaces at Sotheby’s will present stock from 12 galleries, including a show by the blue-chip contemporary Asian art specialist Sundaram Tagore, with jewellery, textiles, arms and armour among the mix. Altogether, the seven participating auction houses are adding 21 auctions of Asian and Islamic art to the 25 or so dealer shows. The most spectacular auction lot promises to be an exceptionally rare pair of 16th-century Chinese wucai or “five-enamel” polychrome “fish” jars and covers, with golden carp swimming among swaying lotus and other flora (Sotheby’s, est £600,000-£1mn). Only one other complete pair is known to survive.

In their own gallery in Clifford Street, leading London dealer Eskenazi focuses on the painterly early blue-and-white porcelains from the Yuan and early Ming dynasties ($500,000 to more than $1mn). Included here is another great rarity, a large guan (jar) from circa 1320-52, its panels ornamented with applied and incised flowering shrubs in underglaze copper red. Daniel Eskenazi is expecting to see Chinese clients and US museum curators returning to London. “When there is a critical mass of high-quality works at auctions, fairs and dealer exhibitions, true collectors do come.”

Frieze Masters, October 9-13, frieze.com. Asian Art in London, October 30-November 8, asianartinlondon.com

A PRETTY seaside town has compared to Cornwall – with a very arty history.

Collioure, in France, has inspired a number of artists including Picasso and Matisse.

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Now dubbed the City of Painters, the Museum of Modern Art continues on the legacy.

As many as three million tourists visit a year, despite having just 3,000 locals.

It was even named France‘s favourite village, in a local competition that has ben running for more than a decade.

Expect influences from both France and Catalonia – it is 15 miles from the Spanish border.

Otherwise it is worth just walking through the multicoloured streets, full of cafes, shops and galleries.

Don’t leave without trying some local Collioure’s anchovies and locally-made white and red wines.

A tourist said it was “one of the prettiest towns in France,” while another said it “could be compared to St Ives in Cornwall“

One of the main attractions is the 800-year-old Meiveal castle, Château Royal de Collioure which is easy to walk to and has the best views of the town.

Anna Richards, who lives in France, said of the village to inews: “So many artists have set up studios that every narrow street feels like a gallery.

“There are hundreds of different kaleidoscopic interpretations of the town, the harbour and the Mediterranean Sea.

“Its two beaches include a crescent of custard-coloured, slightly shingly sand between the harbour and bell tower, and Plage de Port d’Avall, the other side of the Château Royal, which is framed by houses as colourful as an artist’s palette.”

The Château Royal looks like a sandcastle between them, angular and built in blocks, as though it’s made from Lego.

The best way to get there is to fly to Perpignan Airport, with direct UK flights from both London Stansted and Birmingham.

Collioure is just 20 minutes from there by train.

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If you want an affordable stay, there is a Eurocamp just 15 miles away which the Sun’s Joel Davis visited.

Here’s another quaint village in France that is often named the country’s most beautiful.

A tiny French island is a popular place for locals to visit – that Brits may not have heard of.

And here’s the holiday region dubbed the French Cotswolds.

ALDI and Lidl have confirmed the relaunch of their popular wooden toy range with prices starting at just £1.99.

The budget supermarket toys are a perfect gift for this year’s Christmas.

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Lidl’s wooden range is expected to arrive in stores across the UK from October 17 with Aldi’s range available from October 10.

Aldi has announced that they’re bringing back over 50 products to choose from, but shoppers will have to act quickly after their range sold out last year.

Parents will be eager to get their hands on the returning favourites including the Wooden Toy Kitchen, scanning at the tills for £34.99.

The discount retailer chain is also bringing back the wooden Cuthbert which previously caused a stir with M&S fans.

In 2021 M&S lodged an infringement claim against Aldi arguing the chocolate cake was too similar to its classic Colin the Caterpillar which has been around for 30 years with an unchanged design.

But Cuthbert returned to shelves in February last year after the two supermarkets called a truce in an agreed settlement. 

To complete the kitchen experience, Aldi’s Wooden Kitchen Set (£9.99) includes coffee cups, a teapot and coasters.

This Christmas, Aldi’s range includes travel-friendly toys such as the Toy Roleplay Bag costing just £9.99.

The item features a Paramedic and Dentist Set, which allows your children to roleplay their dream jobs.

Aldi is also introducing the New Wooden Horse Box and Beauty Station, scanning for £24.99 each.

Here’s a list of all the wooden toys available this year:

• Wooden Climbing Slide and Arch (£39.99)
• Wooden Climbing Triangle and Cube (£54.99)
• Three Storey Wooden Dolls House (£39.99)
• Wooden Toy Kitchen (£34.99)
• Wooden Bike and Rocker (£24.99) 
• Wooden Aldi Supermarket/Market Stall (£29.99)  
• Wooden Horsebox/Beauty Station (£24.99) 
• Wooden Double-Sided Easel (£24.99) 
• Wooden Hospital/ Airport/ Zoo (£24.99)
• Wooden Castle/ Construction Sets (£24.99) 
• Wooden Washing Machine/Fridge (£19.99)
• Wooden Tabletop Assortment (£19.99 
• Interactive Dog/Cat (£19.99)
• Wooden Baby Walker (£19.99) 
• Wooden Fold Out Playsets (£19.99)
• Wooden Activity Tree (£16.99)
• Wooden Railway Sets (£14.99)
• Wooden Dolls House Furniture (£14.99)
• Wooden Doll Accessories (£11.99)
• Wooden Toy Roleplay Bags (£9.99)
• Wooden Kettle/Coffee/Hot Chocolate/Cleaning Set (£9.99)
• Wooden Kids Tool Belts (£9.99)
• Wooden Kitchen Appliances (£9.99)
• Wooden Play Food/Food Role Play Sets (£9.99) 
• Wooden Fold Out Vehicles (£9.99)
• Wooden Animal Train (£9.99) 
• Play Mat Sets (£9.99)
• Wooden Large Vehicles (£9.99)
• Wooden Doll Care Accessory Sets (£9.99)
• Wooden Kitchen Sets (£9.99)
• Wooden Building Blocks (£9.99)
• Wooden Ramp Racer/Hammer Set (£9.99)
• Wooden Grocery Sets (£8.99)
• Wooden Activity Boards (£10.99)
• Wooden Musical Sets (£8.99)
• Wooden Musical Pull Along Animals (£8.99)
• Wooden Doughnut and Cake Assortment (£7.99)
• Wooden Birthday Cake (£7.99)
• Wooden Family Sets (£7.99)
• Wooden Biscuit Assort (£7.99)
• Plush Dolls 2024 (£6.99)
• Wooden Magnetic Box Assortment (£6.99)
• Wooden Vehicle Box Set (£6.99) 
• Wooden Meal Sets (£6.99)
• Wooden Animal Number Puzzles (£4.99)
• Wooden Vehicles (£3.99)
• Wooden Teething Vehicle (£3.99)
• Wooden 2d Wheeled Animals (£2.99)

Lidl also confirmed the relaunch of its wooden toy range, which parents will be eager to snap up for Christmas.

The popular bargain chain will offer premium toy products for shoppers willing to spend more.

The supermarket’s Wooden Play Kitchen will be scanning at tills for a whopping £49.99 and features a play oven, light-up hobs, a microwave and a sink.

Lidl will also be selling more affordable items in their range such as their Montessori Style Wooden Rainbow Puzzle (£3.99) said to be perfect for households who enjoy hours of family fun.

Here is the full list of wooden toys available at Lidl this year:

• Wooden 2-in-1 Baby Clinic and Vets (£39.99)
• Wooden Toy Tool Assortment (£5.99)
• Wooden Workbench (£49.99)
• Wooden Railway Set Farm, Fairy Land, Police, Fire Department (£7.99)
• Wooden Train Set Construction / Fairground (£29.99)
• Wooden Railway Set XL City / Dinosaur (£39.99)
• Wooden Road City / Racetrack (£14.99)
• Wooden Train Set City / Countryside (£14.99)
• Wooden Train Set (£4.99)
• Wooden Kitchen Accessories (£9.99)
• Wooden Ice Cream Trolley / Tabletop Pizza Oven (£19.99)
• Wooden Chunky Vehicles (£3.99)
• Wooden Room Play Set (£9.99)
• Wooden Kids’ Easel (£19.99)
• Wooden Food Play Set (£6.99)
• Wooden Flexible Doll Family or Doll’s House Furniture (£6.99)
• Wooden Play Kitchen (£49.99)
• Wooden Supermarket Accessories (£9.99)
• Wooden Dressing Table (£39.99)
• Wooden Vehicle Sets (£2.99)
• Wooden Train Set City / Dinosaur World (£39.99)
• 3D Wooden Learning Toys (£9.99)
• Wooden Puzzle (£1.99)
• Wooden Stacking Toy (£7.99)
• Wooden Marble Run (£12.99)
• Wooden Games (£3.99)
• Wooden Learning Games (£3.99)
• Wooden Learning Puzzle (£3.99)
• Wooden Toy Assortment Building Blocks (£7.99)
• Wooden Flexible Doll Family or Doll’s House Furniture (£6.99)
• Montessori Style Wooden Rainbow Puzzle (£3.99)
• Montessori Style Wooden Counting Set (£7.99)
• Montessori Style Wooden Light up Box (£19.99)
• Wooden Learning Games (£3.99)
• Wooden Puzzle / Pull Toy (£3.99)
• Wooden Learning Board Assortment (£7.99)
• Wooden Learning Tablet / Wooden Mobile Phone & Camera (£7.99)
• Wooden Wall Toys (£12.99)

It’s worth checking ahead with your local supermarket if they have what you’re looking for in stock before you go to avoid a wasted trip.

You can check how close you are to your nearest Aldi and Lidl supermarket using this handy store locator.

And remember to scout around other supermarkets for more toy deals – you never know what you can find elsewhere for less.

It comes after Tesco issued an urgent recall urging customers not to buy certain mince pies because they could contain glue.

And shoppers are racing to their nearest supermarket to stock up on Roses, Quality Street, Celebrations, and Heroes tubs, scanning at tills for just £3.95 each.

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“I never had any formal art training: I just learnt as I went along,” says Indian collector and philanthropist Kiran Nadar. Her vast collection of South Asian art now numbers 15,000 pieces, a small selection of which is being shown in a major exhibition at the Barbican cultural centre in London, The Imaginary Institution of India: Art 1975-1998.

In Nadar’s London home, an elegant apartment in a listed building overlooking Regent’s Park, one wall is dominated by a painting of horses by MF Husain — often known as the “Picasso of India” — while, on another wall, a painting by Manjit Bawa shows a flautist playing to a group of grey cows. Small sculptures by Henry Moore are dotted around on the tables and a beautiful inlaid ivory cabinet stands by the door.

Nadar, wearing a flowing green, pink and orange robe, is relaxed, friendly and open as we sit down to talk about how she started collecting, her philanthropy and the new museum she is opening in Delhi.

Her collecting began once she was married. After studying English literature at university in India, Nadar met her husband, Shiv Nadar, the billionaire founder of India’s HCL Technologies, when she was working in advertising and he was a client. “My first major art purchase was of two works by MF Husain for our home — in fact he was asked to paint one but he brought us two, so we kept them. And then I bought a graphic male nude, “Runners” (1982), by Rameshwar Broota — my husband was horrified! I was a bit crestfallen and told him we had to go to the studio and apologise [for changing our minds], but when he met the artist he said I was right to have the painting. And it is in his study to this day.”

But it was only after buying work by Manjit Bawa that she became “galvanised”: “I never really thought I was collecting, just acquiring. But then it reached a stage that we had no more wall space and I was just putting them into storage. It wasn’t even formalised storage, it was in the basement. I realised it was a bit futile to leave them like that.

By 2010 she had acquired 500 works, so she decided to create a space to show them, the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA) — initially on the HCL campus in Noida, Uttar Pradesh, then in South Court Mall in New Delhi, supported by the Shiv Nadar Foundation. A vast new museum, designed by Adjaye Associates, will open on a 100,000-square-metre site directly across from the Indira Gandhi international airport in New Delhi in 2026 or 2027.

I ask her about the choice of the Ghanaian-British architect David Adjaye for her new museum. Since that decision was taken in 2019, Adjaye has been accused of sexual assault, sexual harassment and promoting a toxic work culture according to an investigation in the Financial Times last year, allegations which he has denied.

“The choice [of Adjaye] was made by a jury . . . which whittled applicants to six, out of the initial 60. And Adjaye was the outright winner,” says Nadar. (A 2019 press release said there were five on the shortlist from 47 applicants.) “At that stage, we had absolutely no idea about David’s personal life and we had paid about two-thirds of what our commitment was. So we continue to work with Adjaye Associates and David will not be involved as a person, on any of our projects, until such time that we are comfortable. That’s the way it stands today.”

While her collecting focus was on works by the Bombay Progressive Artists’ Group, a Mumbai-based collective of artists synthesising Indian art history and European Modernism from 1947, she also bought contemporary art: “I bought at huge prices. Then the crash came and even today some of the works haven’t reached what I paid for them at that time.” That “crash”, specifically in Indian art, took place in 2006-07 and was fuelled by speculation and the creation of art funds. Prices continued to fall over the next few years, in some cases, as she says, never to recover.

“We’re keen that Indian art gets more international recognition,” she says. KNMA part-funded the Indian pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2019 (only the second time the country has staged one) and this year organised a retrospective of MF Husain there. “India is such an important country. Every country has a pavilion [at the Biennale] and so should we; if there is no space in the Giardini, there must be another important space [the Biennale organisers] can give us. I think at the next Biennale, India will have its own space.”

As well as Indian art, Nadar’s collection includes western names: she mentions Antony Gormley, Olafur Eliasson and William Kentridge, as well as South Asian diaspora artists such as Shahzia Sikander, Anish Kapoor and Raqib Shaw.

Art isn’t her only passion. “I’m actually very multi-dimensional!” she exclaims, waving a hand in the air. She is one of India’s foremost bridge players and will represent her country at the World Bridge Games in Buenos Aires this year.

I bring the conversation back to the future of her collection. “For the moment it is funded by the foundation, but there will be an endowment. I can’t be here for ever, and I can’t leave it in hands where it’s not going to serve: we will make sure it will be very, very professional.”

‘The Imaginary Institution of India: Art 1975-1998’ runs to January 5, barbican.org.uk