Fakes and forgeries

THE dealer who originally reported the John Anster Fitzgerald (1826-1906) fakes to the police has defended the trade and issued a stark warning to art forgers.

Assay Office London will hold their next Fakes and Forgeries seminar at Goldsmiths’ Hall on Wednesday, January 24.

Bogus Angus McBean photographs have started to circulate this year. The fakes are clearly designed to cash in on a series of exhibitions about the famous surreal and theatrical photographer scheduled for July.

Extra caution is advised when purchasing ‘prisoner of war’ bone ship models following the appearance at auction in March of three models specialists believe are 20th century replicas.

The London Assay Office is advising extra caution when buying antique silver following the assessment of spoons bearing forged marks submitted by four auctioneers last year.

The buyer of a letter purportedly written by Captain Thomas Hardy from HMS Victory six days after the Battle of Trafalgar has belatedly received a full refund after it proved to be a facsimile of a letter in a public collection.

An English judge has issued a stern warning to those who knowingly sell fake merchandise on eBay, handing a suspended prison sentence to a woman who sold a counterfeit collectable over the auction website for almost £1000.

The French art and antiques trade is growing increasingly concerned about heavy-handed police tactics following the recent €15m embezzlement scandal surrounding an employee at a leading French bank.

THE appearance of a significant Lenkiewicz forgery on the market has prompted the foundation dedicated to the artist to set up an authentication service.

IN Antiques Trade Gazette No 1276, February 22, 1997, I reviewed a fascinating but somewhat disconcerting exhibition at Archeus Fine Art in London of drawings by Eric Hebborn (1934-1996), who has been described as the maker of the finest art fakes of the 20th century. The show offered rather convincing ‘Old Master’ drawings after the likes of Raphael, Rembrandt and Watteau, which were selling at prices up to £2500.

CORNISH Ware fakes are becoming more sophisticated.

FRANCE’S new auction watchdog has flexed its muscles for the first time, banning two paintings – one attributed to Van Gogh, the other to Toulouse-Lautrec – from sale on suspicion of being fakes.

LONDON: THERE are just a few places left for the one-day Fakes and Forgeries seminar at Goldsmith’s Hall in the City on January 22. Silver expert and dealer Alastair Dickenson will be the guest speaker. The other speakers include Dr Robert Organ – Superintendent Assayer and Tim Swann – Senior Assayer, both of the London Assay Office.

Allen’s Authentication of Ancient Chinese Bronzes, by Anthony J. Allen, published by Allen’s Enterprises Ltd of Takapuna, Auckland, New Zealand, www.allens.antiques.com and distributed in the UK by David Aldous-Cook: Reference Books on Antiques, Sutton, Surrey. Tel/fax: 0208 642 4842. ISBN 0473080451 £60hb

FELLOWS and Sons, the Birmingham auctioneers, have refunded the buyers of three watercolours sold as the work of Prince Charles last week after the pictures were revealed as forgeries.

At the eleventh hour, manuscripts purporting to be undiscovered music and poems by “America’s first native-born composer” were withdrawn from ,b>Freeman’s of Philadelphia May 16 books and manuscripts sale. Why? Evidence had surfaced that the archive was a sophisticated forgery.

The Italian art market is in shock at the arrest of one of its major players for the sale of fake works of art and other crimes.

TRADING Standards officers have issued a warning to the trade to be on the alert for fake Royal Doulton. Several pieces have come to light over the past few months, including Lambeth Ware.

UK: DOUBTS over the authenticity of several paintings, including a ‘Picasso’, led to the cancellation of a whole sale last week.

SIX claimants have refiled a case against online sales giant EBay that, if successful, could deal a fatal blow to the company’s global status and have huge implications for Internet sales worldwide.