Art forgery is the best crime tbh. It requires absolutely incredible artistic talent, technical skill, and attention to detail to make convincing fakes. Does anyone get hurt from it? No! The only people who suffer for it are the extremely wealthy who want the prestige of having original paintings in their own homes. It’s full of international intrigue and mystery. Perfect.
I liked this guy’s story, Mark Landis, who conned several dozen museums into displaying his forgeries, but when the FBI came after him they couldn’t do anything because he had always given them away as donations. They said if they could have found that he’d ever taken anything in exchange they would have prosecuted him, but all he wanted was get to out of the house and meet people.
“The first painting Landis “donated” was a copy of a work by Maynard Dixon, an artist well-known for his paintings of cowboys and Indians. It started as impulse, Landis says, but then “everybody was just so nice and treated me with respect and deference and friendship, things I was very unused to — I mean, actually not used to at all. And I got addicted to it.”” And it looks like all his forgeries are done with cheap materials, like markers and Hobby Lobby frames.
Ok, but Wolfgang Beltracchi is probably one of the best Fraud Artists in the world.
His career brought him millions upon millions of dollars and lasted almost 40 years. He finally admitted to painting fraudulent art after the white paint he used came under scrutiny.
“ Bob Simon: What do you think this Max Ernst would be worth?
Wolfgang Beltracchi: This one?
Simon: Yeah.
Beltracchi: $5 million, I think.
Simon: $5 million. And you can do it in three days?
Beltracchi: Yeah, oh yes, yes, sure, or quicker”
-From a 60 minutes interview with Bob Simon
In The interview with Beltracchi, he said that none of his forgeries are copies, they’re all original works that the famous artists could have painted.
“Beltracchi estimates he has done 25 Max Ernsts. He is not copying an existing work. He’s painting something he thinks Ernst might have done if he’d had the time or felt like it.”
- The Con Artist: A multi-million dollar art scam
His wife was also in on the scam, she would dress up in old clothing and take pictures holding the paintings with old cameras to fake proof of the paintings’ ages.
At the end of the interview with Wolfgang Beltracchi he was asked if he felt he had done anything wrong, his answer was “ Yeah, I used the wrong kind of paint”
Keating painted more than 2,000 forgeries by over 100 different artists in his sixty-six years. Many had fraudulently sold at auctions with the total profits estimated at over 10 million dollars. “I flooded the market with the work of Palmer and many others,” the artist said. “Not for gain (I hope I am no materialist) but simply as a protest against the merchants who make capital out of those I am proud to call my brother artists, both living and dead. It seemed disgraceful to me how many of them had died in poverty,” he defended in The Fake’s Progress, his autobiography. “All their lives they had been exploited by unscrupulous dealers and then, as if to dishonor their memory, these same dealers continued to exploit them in death.” […] Keating had a great respect and understanding of all the artists he imitated but was always reckless in his handling of the materials. He often used house paint and poster paint to mix in with his acrylics as a cheaper way to achieve the impasto works. At times he wouldn’t bother preparing his antique canvases he found at the junk shops out of laziness, so that in just a few years the paint would peel right off to reveal what was originally underneath. Keating often planted what he called “time bombs” like this in his paintings. Because of his understanding of the chemicals used in art restoration, Keating would purposely paint with layers of glycerin, which would destroy the painting once it was cleaned by a restorer, proving it was a fake. He often wrote obscenities under his paintings, like “Bollocks!”, in lead white so that it could be seen by the experts who x-rayed the painting to check its authenticity.
This is "Light Me Up" by Lindsey Berres. Closeups here.
Here is the (partial?) gallery of entrants on the QuiltCon website, but the image files are so large that I literally can't load them so have a selection of much lower quality screengrabs from this video tour instead...
"Neural Overlap" by Jane Eileen García (3rd place)
"Surfacing" by Tara Glastonbury
"Dot Your Eyes" by Nora Bauser
"Risograph Rings" by Colleen Kesterson
"Benched" by Linda Hungerford
"Windmill Meadows" by Lynett Muhaso
"Starman" by Lorena Uriarte
"Triple Silk Transluscence" by Cassandra Beaver
"Who Invited Cyan?" by Samantha Saturday
"Star Crossed" by Karin Rabe
"Contintuity of Radiance" by Svetlana Silver
"Mod Layers" by Anthea Naylor
"Dialectic No. 4" by Heather Akerberg
"Perfect Pansies" by Holly Clarke
"Still Life #1" by Barbara Strick
"Circle of Friends" by Erin Case
"Orange Peel Overlay" by Stephanie Bracelyn""Orange Peel Overlay" by Stephanie Bracelyn
tiny ancient greek and roman craftspeople in my circulatory system are using accumulated microplastics to decorate the insides of my blood vessels with beautiful mosaics. Nobody can see them, but they’re still art.
The latest installment of my artbooks / sketchbooks. 113 pages. It contains my thoughts on art, original sketches for some of my digital art
NEW ARTBOOK FOR SALE !
If you like my work, consider checking out my newest artbook! 113 pages, $10 minimum :) purchase includes passkey for the published flipbook (recommended viewing for 2-page spreads!
Submitted by you, voted for by you, I'd like to present the voicelines you were just dying to hear being said by Kim - dutifully performed by the brilliant Jullian Champenois.
In 10th place,
How did we get here? We walked, believe it or not. You were not entirely lucid.
You are welcome and encouraged to use these for memes, shitposts, and other foolish fan content on social media. When you do, please include credit to Jullian Champenois. You can also include a link to his website, tag him on Instagram/Twitter (@julliannailluj), or mention his Youtube channel according to the content you make.
Commercial content of any kind - ads, promoted videos, etc - is explicitly forbidden by these usage terms. Anything of this sort will require specific permission by Jullian. Please don't fuck around we love him.
That's it! Thank you everyone for participating, reading, and enjoying this silly little project.
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