Police display fake art pieces at exhibition to warn London dealers

LONDON -- Pseudo Picassos, counterfeit Chagalls and other fakes were on display in London last week as part of an effort by Scotland Yard to warn dealers about forged art that it says fuels crime gangs around the world.\nWhile the exhibit at the Victoria and Albert Museum looks like any other art gallery, the chatter among dealers centered on crime rather than composition, and the program was not open to the public.\n"It made you fascinated by the terrifying skills of some of these people," said Fiona Ford of The Association of Arts & Antiques Dealers. "If every dealer saw this exhibition, it would further impress on them how careful they have to be."\nFor the art world, the danger is that forgeries can devalue the real thing. Documentation -- allegedly authenticating a piece of art -- also can be forged, said Detective Sgt. Vernon Rapley, so even art accompanied by a detailed provenance can be suspect.\nArt historian Thomas Hoving, former director of New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, has estimated that the market comprises up to 40 percent of some type of forgery.\nPolice say the work of one talented duo could keep devaluing art in the future.\nJohn Drewe worked in Britain 20 years ago. While his partner in crime, John Myatt, would copy the works of Marc Chagall, Georges Braque and Ben Nicholson, Drewe would create the documentation to pass them off as genuine. A few hours' work could net the pair thousands, Rapley said.\nMyatt assisted police in the investigation of Drewe and served one year in prison. Drewe was sentenced to six years in prison and ordered to pay $238,000 in restitution. Officers said Drewe might have made as much as $1.9 million from the scheme.\nUp to 100 Myatt fake paintings could still be on the market, Rapley said.\nAfter completing his jail term, Myatt is now taking orders for what he calls "genuine fakes" in the style of famous artists, which can also cost thousands of dollars.\nDrewe's work included planting faked catalogues, which experts rely on to authenticate a work, in the libraries of legitimate art dealers. That scam was ultimately more damaging to the art world, Rapley said, because it could cause a real painting with little documentation to be valued at less than a fake with Drewe's documents.\n"That would obviously be a very sad day for the history of art," Rapley said.\nBrothers Robert and Brian Thwaites were also renowned forgers, noted for their attention to detail.\nThe pair was careful to use materials from the era of the artists they copied, even sticking scraps of Victorian newspapers to the backs of canvasses to make them look more authentic. That made it difficult to detect their forgeries.\nThe brothers duped two dealers out of more than $229,000 but came under suspicion when they tried to sell a third painting. When police raided their studio, they found a fake Edgar Hunt painting still wet on the easel, according to Detective Constable Michelle Roycroft.\nIn addition to Hunt, the brothers also forged Victorian painter John Anster Fitzgerald -- famous for his paintings of fairies.\nThe Thwaites were convicted in September of deception. Robert Thwaites was sentenced to two years in prison while Brian received a suspended one-year sentence.\nWhen the art unit executes a search warrant, it often finds drugs and evidence of other crimes, such as fake Rolex watches, Detective Constable Ian Lawson said.\nAnother thriving area of forgery is the faking of archaeological finds.\n"We know for a fact that there is a terrorism link," Lawson said. "Archaeological stuff is being exported by the ton load from Middle Eastern countries. If the money goes back into criminality, some will inevitably end up in the hands of terrorists"