British officials are trying to keep a major painting by the late London-born artist Howard Hodgkin from leaving the UK. Last week, the country’s Department for Culture, Media, and Sport (DCMS) placed an export ban on *Mrs Acton in Delhi* (1967–71), giving a British museum or gallery the chance to buy it instead. The move comes after the work sold at Bonhams in London last October for £1.7 million (around $2.3 million), setting a new auction record for Hodgkin. Hodgkin began the painting just three years after his first trip to India, a place that captivated him from childhood through to the end of his life. According to officials, the work captures a key moment in the artist’s development, showing the shift from his early Pop art influences toward the emotionally charged abstraction that would later define his style. *Mrs Acton in Delhi* depicts the wife of British Council representative John Stewart Acton, lounging on a balcony overlooking the Indian capital.…