The Art Thief: A Novel

by Noah Charney

  “But I digress. If a forger can find documentation of a missing artwork, for instance a Michelangelo drawing that is not extant, but that is mentioned in an extant letter, then the forger essentially is matching an artwork of his own creation to already existing provenance. That whets the excitement of scholars, who are all too often so eager for a new discovery, that they will overlook details and look too hard for corroboration of hypotheses. In this way, a keen scholar can fall into the forger’s hands, and aid in the crime unknowingly.”

  The V&A lecture had been on art theft, as well. Seemed to be this fellow’s specialty. But Harry had heard of Coffin, and they’d crossed paths professionally, as well. Coffin had been involved behind the scenes in stopping the attempt to ransom Edvard Munch’s The Scream, the first time it had been brazenly stolen in front of rolling CC-TV cameras from the National Gallery in Oslo, Norway. The whole job had been caught on video. Two men leaned a ladder up against the side of the museum, climbed in a window, and walked away with The Scream under one of their arms. All on camera. Of course, no one had been looking at the monitors in security, so they got away, for a while. It was an amateur job, Soviet bloc mafia types who’d pounded their way into the museum and had no sense of the art world. They’d been caught, needless to say, soon after ransom demands were made.

  “So, the best sort of forgery, and I mean ‘best’ in the sense of having the greatest chance at success, requires airtight provenance. The better the provenance, the less the artwork will be scrutinized before it is deemed legitimate. But a forger cannot survive on provenance and hungry scholars alone. Let us use, for an example, a small, an anonymous Italian medieval panel painting. Forging is like cooking. You need to know the ingredients to produce a dish before you start to cook. What are the ingredients of such a painting?

  “Well, to begin with, what is the support? Are we making linguini or capellini? It’s either canvas or panel, and in this period, it would have almost exclusively been a smooth poplar-wood panel. But it has to be wood that can be dated back to the period of the painting forged. There’s the rub.

  “’What’s the medium?’ is question number two. Is it pesto or bolognese? You’ll have to forgive my simplistic analogies, but I promise you, they stick. You’ll leave this lecture tonight, and you won’t be thinking to yourself, ‘Did he say poplar wood or pear wood was the most common support for medieval religious painting?’ You’ll have an inexplicable craving for pasta, and find yourself thinking about forgeries in the midst of your penne all’arrabbiata. The medium? If it’s early enough, and style would suggest that, then it would be tempera paint. Now, Renaissance and Early Modern paintings are more difficult to forge than Modern. Can you guess why?”

  Wickenden was trying to place Coffin’s accent. It was neither here nor there, with an American tone mixed with the received pronunciation accent taught to British newscasters and foreign actors playing Brits. Wickenden could usually tell a lot about a man’s history from his accent, but this one had him at a loss.

  “It was not until the nineteenth century that artists bought pre-made paint. Artists cooked up their own paints in their studios, which meant that every painter had a slightly different recipe for each color. In order to accurately forge any painting before this period, the forger needs to know the composition of that specific artist’s colors. And these colors have to be reproduced from scratch. The materials are available. As basic as it sounds, an egg is cracked open and dipped into, to form the bonding element in tempera, and then mixed with a raw pigment, such as lapis lazuli, for blue, or sepia, made from squid ink, for a burnt orange umber. But, the organic materials in the paint must be carbon datable back to the correct century.”

  Wickenden’s second encounter with Coffin in person had been in the line of duty. Coffin, at least some time ago, had worked for the Carabinieri. There was a case across borders, and the Carabinieri had always been willing to work with law enforcement from other nations. Harry admired them for that. In his experience, Scotland Yard had always been more isolationist. Maybe it’s the whole island thing.

  “This necessary chemical knowledge allows us, the hunters, to narrow the profile. The requisite intelligence, in the sense of specific knowledge and general brain power, can drastically limit the number of suspects. In simple terms, there are fewer smart people out there than there are dummies, and that can be to the advantage of law enforcers. It is not easy to forge well. It is quite miraculous, in fact, that criminals are willing to attempt it, and are actually successful. Success truly requires a willingness and complicity, however inadvertent, on the part of the victim. Close scrutiny will root out the inevitable flaws in the forger’s armor. It is my opinion that, if a forger’s work is perfect, then he deserves to get away with it. But I’ve never come across a forgery that approached perfection. Those deceived inevitably look back upon it with self-derision, for having been taken in by what is, in the light of day, clearly fake.

  “Once you have the ingredients, you need the artistic skill to reproduce masterpieces in a convincing manner. The artwork has to be convincingly ‘aged.’ A story concocted as to how it was ‘found,’ that links to its provenance. Then, the entire package, product, provenance, and story, must be believed by someone. It is a long and winding road.

  “Other art forms are easier to forge, you may think? The components may be fewer, but this does not necessarily make them easier. One must also think of value. It is in no one’s interest to forge a Piranesi print. That is not to say that it’s not been done, but the potential return, in the low-thousands-of-pounds range, is probably not worth the effort required. You’ve got to match the ink, find paper of the period. So, while the requisite components, just period paper and ink, are fewer, so are the rewards. Good forgery is a high-cost endeavor.”

  Wickenden’s department at Scotland Yard had been tracing a stolen set of pre-Columbian figurines, which had gone missing from the home of an aged collector. They were so small that the six figurines could fit into a travel toiletry kit, and had. The suspect, a Milanese, was thought to have fled to Rome, and the Carabinieri were contacted. Gabriel Coffin, as a Brit working with the Carabinieri, was the primary liaison and had exchanged many phone calls with Wickenden. They’d met in person only once, just before the arrest. But Coffin had earned a reputation as a consultant in recent years, since his young retirement from active duty with the Carabinieri. He couldn’t be more than forty, Wickenden thought, young bugger. It was in this informal capacity that Wickenden planned to speak with him. He did not like being told, or rather suggested, what to do by Van Der Mier. But he recognized a good idea when it was forced on him.

  “Needless to say, the world of master forgers is minuscule. The best develop reputations, and are often, but not always, caught. When they are, it is usually not due to their own mistake. Hubris seems to be the only consistent chink in apprehended master forgers.

  “As I am already running long, I shall give you a brief, real-life example of a master forgery. It involves the Getty Museum, and the reputable Colnaghi Gallery, revenge and disgrace.

  “The story begins when this master forger had stumbled upon a drawing in a flea market, which he’d purchased with the hope that it might be more valuable than the price indicated. He had no specific idea as to what it might be, but he took the chance. He brought the piece in to Colnaghi on Old Bond Street, one of London’s oldest and most renowned art dealers. An expert there said, yes, this is worth more than you paid for it, and said that Colnaghi would buy it for two hundred pounds. A significant profit, the man accepted the offer, and walked away pleased.

  “A week later, he was walking down Old Bond Street once more, and stopped by the window of Colnaghi. He found that the drawing he’d sold was on offer. For sixty thousand pounds. He was furious, and he decided that a subtle, artful revenge would be sweetest and could turn lucrative. He taught himself, based on no prior experience, to forge drawings. He was an intelligent man, with considerable artistic talent,
and he read his way into master forgery. He bought sixteenth-century books of low value, to use their pages as support for his forgeries. He studied the drawing styles of Italian artists of the period. He melted down the ink from the books, to provide fuel for his drawings. And he created his first piece of forgery. A friend posed as a seller and contacted Colnaghi. They said that they’d be happy to look at the piece. The friend brought the drawing in and professed to know nothing of the artist, but it had long been in his family. Colnaghi experts identified the piece as by a known sixteenth-century Italian artist, and offered to buy it for over one hundred thousand pounds. With this success, a forger was born.

  “Over the next decades, the master forger, who has since been caught, claims to have made, and sold, hundreds of fake Old Master drawings through Colnaghi. Colnaghi did not suffer fiscally, and it was only the forger’s sense of satisfaction at tricking these so-called experts, that repaid his efforts at revenge. But his own bank account was nicely lined by his handiwork, and Colnaghi became his primary financier. He avoided detection by changing the identity of sellers, and by copying, with an equal degree of skill, a wide variety of different artists. The degree of his success was only brought out in a plea bargain while he was imprisoned, and that is when his name became synonymous with success in this crime of utmost proficiency.

  “The Getty Museum purchased several drawings from Colnaghi that one of their own curators later accused of being forged. With millions of dollars’ worth of crow to eat, the Getty denied the allegations of its own scholar and refused to test the drawings. The curator even believed he recognized the hand of the forger, as that of the then-deceased Colnaghi revenger. But the Getty refused to budge. The curator was fired, disgraced for having made a public accusation of counterfeit that was never substantiated. Blacklisted, he was not hired again within the art community. He now works abroad, under a different name…”

  Wickenden’s mind began to wander. He’d heard the story before. Colleagues had put the forger in prison. His gaze wandered to the backs of heads arranged in front of him. So many blondes with their hair done up. Not that he minded.

  He snapped awake at the applauding audience, as they slowly skidded into silence when Professor Sheila McLeod approached the lectern. Wickenden had seen her before and always quite fancied her.

  “On behalf of the Courtauld Institute of Art, I would like to thank Dr. Coffin for that fascinating and insightful lecture. Next week, we will have Professor David Simon, an internationally renowned scholar of Romanesque architecture and sculpture, lecturing on his extensive work at Jaka Cathedral. Thank you.”

  The students murmured their way out of the lecture hall. Coffin exchanged words with McLeod and, out of the corner of his eye, saw a droopy-looking man standing, wilt-shouldered, near the back of the room.

  When most of the crowd had gone, Professor McLeod was still standing with Coffin. Wickenden nodded from across the room, but Coffin didn’t see. Harry pretended that he had a crick in his neck. Finally Coffin met his gaze, and Harry approached.

  “Inspector. Good to see you again.” Coffin extended his hand, which brushed Wickenden’s, making the latter jump. Wickenden was unused to unannounced human contact and trespass on his personal space. He looked at it for a moment, then clicked, and shook it. Coffin’s grip was firm. He was dressed in an Italian-cut black suit, wearing a starched, blue-collared dress shirt beneath it.

  “Dr. Coffin.”

  “Please, it’s Gabriel.” He turned to McLeod. “We’re old friends from work. Back when I was a Carabiniere, if you can believe it. Harry, I’ve got to go and have drinks with the students for just a moment. Will you join me? Hope you don’t mind.”

  “I, uh, no, that’s fine.”

  “Lead on, Sheila.” Gabriel and Harry followed Sheila out of the lecture hall, down the gently wound stairs of the academic portion of the Courtauld Institute. Out in the courtyard at sunset, the lights of the belly of Somerset House burned a gentle white, casting vertical shadows and a glaze of coral blue over the pale gray stone. The iridescence phosphoresced through the spouts of water from the fountain.

  They entered the gallery across the way, up the torqued stairs that Rowlandson had caricatured. On the top floor, a small, faceted gem of Impressionist and post-Impressionist artworks dotted and bejeweled the walls. Students mingled, never straying too far from the wine served on the landing. Coffin wandered through the galleries. Manet’s Déjeuner sur l’Herbe. Daumier’s Don Quixote. Monet, Cézanne. He sipped his wine. It tasted of tannin and sulfide.

  “They’ll feed anything to students,” he said. Harry half-smiled, then retracted, as Coffin looked away. “I love Degas,” he continued. “Scholars say that his pastels of women bathing are misogynistic, because he posed them in awkward positions. Rising from the bath, or drawing a comb through long red hair. But I’ve always seen them as longingly in love with the subtle machinations of the female body.”

  “Hmmph,” said Wickenden.

  “You’re not a fan, Harry?” Coffin moved into another room.

  “I chase criminals, Dr. Coffin. I’m smarter than they are, and I like that. Whether they’ve stolen a car, a bag of money, or a piece of cloth with some paint on it, it doesn’t matter to me. I like to solve the puzzle. I like understanding. But the money involved in this industry gives me indigestion, and I can’t tell a Degas from a Manet from a fancy I-don’t-know-what. I don’t mind any of it, but that’s about as much enthusiasm as I can muster. Thankfully I don’t have to be an enthusiast to do a damn good job at my profession, which I do. I admire skill at the game as, it seems, do you. What the game is, checkers or chess or burglary, I don’t give a flying…”

  “I used to play chess,” Coffin interrupted, his gaze lost along the gallery walls. “Quite a bit, when I was younger. Ah…I think you’ll find this interesting, Harry.” Coffin gestured toward two paintings on the wall, black voids in which floated a pattern of shapes and colors, like a suspension in ink. Harry reined up beside Coffin, a full foot shorter, and more musty.

  “Now,” continued Coffin, “this painting on the left is an original by the Russian Wassily Kandinsky. He, like his contemporary countryman, Kasimir Malevich, used abstract painting as a vehicle for the concentrated projection of spirituality. He painted what he found spiritually moving. And it is worth millions. But here’s where it gets interesting. This painting on the right…”

  “It looks the same to me.”

  “That’s right, Harry. It does. But this painting on the right is a modern replica, worth a few hundred quid, perhaps, if that.”

  Harry looked from one painting to the other, then back again, and again.

  “Now that’s amazing, Doctor. I have to say, that’s something I really admire. Like I was saying, displays of skill…ability, no matter the…now, how did you know that this one on the right is a fake? Looks exactly the same.”

  Coffin smiled, and pointed to the wall. Beside the painting on the right, hung a sign that read REPLICA. Harry flashed and recoiled a very brief smile.

  “Look deeper. Observation, Harry. We can make a conscious choice to see, not just to look at. Passive versus active viewing. Observation and logical deduction, the…”

  ”…two tools that everyone has, and no one uses. I heard you lecture, Doctor. There’s a lesson in there, somewhere…. But at least you practice what you preach. I’ve been saying for years that I must cut down on my caffeine intake, but I’m still at ten cups a day. Abstinence gives me indigestion.”

  In the next room, Coffin stopped for a long while. Harry’s eyes were down at his feet, but he looked up when he saw Gabriel’s stop.

  “Manet’s Bar at the Folies-Bergères. Is this not the best thing ever?”

  The unusual placement of the negative threw off Wickenden. He didn’t quite know what to say.

  “I just love it,” Gabriel continued. “She looks so sad. But so much more.”

  A female student giggled her way over to where Coffin,
McLeod, and Wickenden stood, goaded by her friends. “Professor Coffin?” Gabriel always liked it when people called him that. “If you were going to nick one of the paintings from this museum, which would it be?”

  “Lucy Jarvis, that’s not a very nice…”

  “No, it’s all right, Sheila. I think that’s an excellent question, Lucy. I often like to play that game when I wander through museums. But I play it in each new room.” Coffin leaned his chin on fist, an art historical reference, as he surveyed the room. “But an easy decision. I’d take that one.” He pointed at the Manet.

  “Why?” Several other students had gathered around, after refilling their glasses. Wickenden wasn’t sure if he was annoyed, or just curious. He decided he was curious.

  “It’s a self-conscious masterwork. Manet knew that this was his big bopper, painted just before he died. The scale shows its importance. And the subject is of the zeitgeist. The woman stands, facing straight out at us. She looks sad, frightened, but there is more to her gaze. The Mona Lisa can go screw herself, as far as I’m concerned.” Giggles from the students.

  Coffin continued. “The woman is a bartender at the nightclub, the Folies-Bergères. See behind her? The club was two stories tall, with an open theater space in the middle, where acts could perform. In the top left, you can just see the legs of an acrobat on a trapeze. I know they look blurred, but the figures in the audience are identifiable, real characters from late nineteenth-century Paris.