January 14, 2006	Saturday	Zilhaj 13, 1426

PARIS: Despite a barrage of sophisticated techniques, the simple magnifying glass and gut instinct remain the best tools for unmasking a fake Rembrandt or van Gogh, experts told a seminar here.

But true forgeries aimed at fooling art-lovers remain rare, the audience at the seminar held on Wednesday and Thursday in the Drouot auction rooms was assured.

“There are few hoaxers around, and fakes are rare,” said Michel Maket, an expert in 19th and 20th century painting, who confessed he had once seen through his hands two identical Matisse drawings, the real one and a very good fake.

“It was the same paper, the same format, the date, but the lines weren’t quite as deft as on the real one,” he said.

The two-day seminar, “True or False, criteria for authenticity in the art market”, was organized by the European Confederation of Art Experts.

Accompanied by an exhibition, it aimed to answer such questions as how to distinguish a true masterpiece from a fake, and what is the difference between a copy, a fake and an imitation?

“Something is only a fake, if it aims to fool someone into believing it is the real thing, otherwise it’s just a copy,” said Eric Turquin, an expert in old masterpieces.

There are “two sides to a forgery, the forger and his client” who wants to believe he is buying a work of art, he added.

Some of the most famous forgeries were painted by a mediocre Dutch artist, Hans van Meegeren, in what became one of the biggest scandals of the 20th century art world.

Van Meegeren faked six “new” paintings by Johannes Vermeer, using original 17th century canvases and inventing an aging process. The paintings were put on the market as new discoveries over a period of 10 years, until Van Meegeren was arrested in 1945 on charges of collaboration with Nazi Germany when he confessed to the fraud.

“At the time Vermeer was very fashionable, as Georges de la Tour is today,” said Turquin. Van Meegeren “tried to paint what his clients wanted. The market was looking for Vermeers and the market supplied them.”

Anyone who thinks they have stumbled on a missing masterpiece in their attic or in a car boot sale should be on the look-out for certain tell-tale clues which can indicate if a painting is authentic or not.—AFP