I was recently given the book ‘The Forger’s Spell’ by Edward Dollnick. This is a story of a Dutch painter called van Meegeren who painted in the 1920s and 30s, and it goes like this. Han van Meegeren was a painter of, apparently, little talent. Or so the critics said. Van Meegeren himself had a different idea, and was not entirely thrilled with the way his peers viewed him. He quickly came to the conclusion that if he were to come to the recognition that he thought he deserved (and his lifestyle demanded), he would have to go beyond himself. And beyond himself he went. Great painter or not, van Meegeren had the cunning that would fool just about the whole art world of the time and make for, what appears to be, a colossal hoax.
His plan was simple. He would imitate the style of one of the great Dutch masters. But mimicking a given style would not be enough. If he was to stand a chance of ever passing as a 16th century Master, he would have to use the materials of the 1600s, or at least replicate how 1600s material would appear in the 20th century. Living in the Netherlands, it was not difficult to find a 1600s oil on canvas painting. He would first have to diligently scrape off the paint. An interesting detail (as always where one finds the devil!) is that solidified oil on canvas becomes harder with time. Van Meegeren was aware of this as well as of the fact that the paint’s hard texture would become the one challenge to beat. Fortunately for him, round about the time of our story, a (n other) famous Belgian called Baekeland would discover a material known as Bakelite, or simply ‘plastic’ (well, early plastic, we use other stuff today). Van Meegeren would spend years experimenting with baking paint contortions based on Bakelite. Most of them would end in baking disasters, but with the right instincts and lots of patience, he would eventually manage to calibrate the temperature to reproduce the desired texture. The story goes that when he took the canvas off the fire and saw the result, he cried!
The Master to imitate would be Vermeer (of the ‘Girl with the Pearl Earring’ fame). Note that he did not copy Vermeer's paintings; that would have been too obvious. He studied him and then picked few signature elements of the grand painter and set out to revive him! His first painting would find itself, as though by chance, in the hands of the most known expert. He then took the back seat while the world rejoiced in the thought of a newly discovered Vermeeer. Or actually, 6 new Vermeers. One by one they would find their way in the hands of gullible art collectors! For those of us not in the know-how, there are only about 30 authentic Vermeers (unlike Rembrandt who has a lot…a lot more!) so the art world is starved of the Delft mastery (see what I mean by cunning?)!
There was simply no end to the critics’ vanity! It turns out that van Meegeren wasn't a very good painter at all! His Master forgeries have a number of technical errors, which are visible even to my inexpert eye. But the more errors specialists found, the more critics authenticated his work, as "...the master is clearly learning!"
Van Meegeren delighted in his accomplishments and enjoyed becoming a very rich man in the process. But secretly, like any criminal(or is this just too strong a word?), he was itching to be discovered, and tell the whole world that he had fooled them; that he had fooled them big time! At the end of WWII, and suspicious of all the wealth he had enjoyed during the war, the whole thing inevitably unravelled. And while van Meegeren would be more than happy to demonstrate in the most minute detail howdunit, the critics never believed him (!!). The Dutch public deemed him a hero as the one who had swindled Goering (one of his paintings were sold to Goering who was a sucker for anything vaguely valuable!). Nevertheless, they tried him and eventually charged him with deception and condemned him to one year in prison. He died before he could serve his term. His paintings were removed from the main halls of the various museums they were exhibited but they still remain some the most sought out paintings by visitors.
While I am not going to condone deceit, there is something delightful about the one-upmanship of this story. For anyone who has ever tried to publish in academic journals, and has received ‘expert’ referee reports, this story will strike a very fine cord…
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