THE ARTFUL DODGERS; When Graham Southern and Harry Blain sold the Haunch of Venison gallery to Christie's they didn't envisage they would be blackballed by the art world. Now they've quit and taken their best artists with them. Sholto Byrnes on the battle of Burlington Gardens.(Features)

Byline: Sholto Byrnes

If there is one question on the lips of collectors, critics, curators and the merely curious, as they gather for London's art week, it is this: why have Harry Blain and Graham Southern, founderdirectors of Haunch of Venison, left the gallery they set up in 2002? A gallery that became so successful that The Independent asked last year: 'Is Harry Blain Brit Art's most powerful man?'

Not only have the pair left - provoking headlines such as 'High-profile divorce stuns art world' and 'Smoked Venison' - but they have opened a new space and taken four of Haunch's most prized artists with them. Blain Southern, as their new premises on Dering Street are called, opened this week with a show by the prominent YBA Mat Collishaw. Artists Bill Viola, Rachel Howard and Anton Henning have decamped with him. As if that's not enough, Harry Blain tells me that a total of ten or 11 artists have gone with them - more than a quarter of their old gallery's roster. 'We didn't put out a list,' he says, 'because we didn't want to be hurtful.' But Matthew Carey-Williams, Haunch's new director, appears not even to be aware just how many of his stars are defecting. 'Will we see a couple of others go? It's very likely that we will,' he tells me. 'Will it be ten? Absolutely not.'

Blain and Southern may have set up the gallery seven years ago, but for the past three years Haunch has been owned by Christie's International. It was clear that this was never an entirely successful enterprise for the auction house: strains began to show after less than two years and for the past 18 months Blain and Southern were in discussions with Christie's management about the future direction of the gallery. 'It was a constant topic of conversation,' says Blain. Eventually, they tired of the internal politicking and of the carping by an art world that never forgave them for selling to Christie's. 'It made them pariahs,' says one respected critic. 'They may have made a huge amount of dosh, but people lost respect for them.' The pair decided they wanted their freedom. They o ered to buy the gallery back, but negotiations failed after Christie's, according to one source, 'wouldn't offer a commercial price'. We could be forgiven for thinking that a state of war has been declared between two of London's most influential contemporary art dealers and the world's largest auction …