Portrait of an Unknown Woman (Gabriel Allon #22) (118)
The National Gallery purchased the painting in 1980—at Christie’s auction house in London—for $5.4 million. At the time, it was the third-highest price ever paid for a work of art. In today’s market a sale of that size would hardly be newsworthy, as soaring prices have turned paintings into yet another asset class for the superrich—or, in the words of the late Manhattan art dealer Eugene Thaw, “a commodity like pork bellies or wheat.” A. Alfred Taubman, the shopping mall developer and fast-food investor who purchased Sotheby’s in 1983, cynically observed that “a precious painting by Degas and a frosted mug of root beer” had much in common, at least when it came to the potential for profit. In April 2002, Taubman was sentenced to a year in prison for his role in the price-fixing scheme with rival Christie’s that swindled customers out of more than $100 million.
Increasingly, much of the world’s most valuable art resides not in museums or private homes but in darkened, climate-controlled vaults. More than a million paintings are reportedly hidden away in the Geneva Free Port, including at least a thousand works by Pablo Picasso. Many collectors and curators are troubled by the degree to which paintings have become just another investment vehicle. But those who are in the business of buying and selling art for profit are just as likely to disagree. “Paintings,” the New York gallery owner David Nash told the New York Times in 2016, “are not a public good.”
Most change hands under conditions of absolute secrecy, at ever-increasing prices, with little or no oversight. It is little wonder, then, that the art world has been beset by a succession of multimillion-dollar forgery scandals. The problem is doubtless made worse by the apathy of the courts and police. Remarkably, none of the forgers and their accomplices mentioned above received more than a slap on the wrist for their crimes. Front woman Glafira Rosales was sentenced to time served for her role in the Knoedler scandal. John Myatt and Wolfgang Beltracchi, after serving brief prison terms, now make their livings selling “genuine fakes” and other original works online. Beltracchi, during an interview with the CBS News program 60 Minutes, expressed only one regret—that he had used the inaccurately labeled tube of titanium white paint that had led to his exposure.
The French forger Guy Ribes was likewise able to put his talent to legitimate use. It is Ribes, not actor Michel Bouquet, who mimics the brushstrokes of Auguste-Pierre Renoir in a 2012 film about the final years of the painter’s life. Ribes also executed the “Renoirs” used in the film’s production—with the assistance of the Musée d’Orsay, which granted him a private viewing of the Renoirs in its possession, including several not on public display. James Ivory lamented the fact that the notorious French art forger had not been available to work on the 1996 motion picture Surviving Picasso. Said the legendary director: “It would have been, visually, a different film.”
Acknowledgments
I am grateful to my wife, Jamie Gangel, who listened patiently while I worked out the intricate plot and twists of Portrait of an Unknown Woman and then skillfully edited the first draft of my typescript. My debt to her is immeasurable, as is my love.
Anthony Scaramucci, founder of the investment firm Skybridge Capital, took time out of his busy schedule to help me create a fraudulent art-based hedge fund propped up by the sale and collateralization of forged paintings. London art dealer Patrick Matthiesen patiently answered each of my questions, as did Maxwell L. Anderson, who has five times served as the director of a North American art museum, including the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. Not to be outdone, renowned art conservator David Bull—for better or worse, he is known in certain circles as “the real Gabriel Allon”—read my nearly 600-page typescript in its entirety, all while rushing to complete the restoration of a canvas by the Italian Renaissance artist Jacopo Bassano.
Legendary Vanity Fair writer-at-large Marie Brenner gave me invaluable insight into her work and the New York art world; and David Friend, the magazine’s editor of creative development, shared harrowing stories of past investigations into the affairs of powerful men. I can say with certainty that there is a conference room in Vanity Fair’s newsroom on the twenty-fifth floor of One World Trade Center—and that it overlooks New York Harbor. Otherwise, the chaotic sequence of events depicted in the climax of Portrait of an Unknown Woman bears little resemblance to the way Vanity Fair reports, edits, and publishes consequential pieces of investigative journalism.
My Los Angeles super-lawyer Michael Gendler was, needless to say, a source of wise counsel. Louis Toscano, my dear friend and longtime editor, made countless improvements to the novel, as did Kathy Crosby, my eagle-eyed personal copy editor. Any typographical errors that slipped through their formidable gauntlet are my responsibility, not theirs.
I consulted more than a hundred newspaper and magazine articles while writing Portrait of an Unknown Woman, far too many to cite here. I owe a special debt to the reporters of Artnet, ARTnews, the Art Newspaper, the Guardian, and the New York Times for their coverage of the most recent Old Master forgery scandal. Five books were especially helpful: Anthony M. Amore, The Art of the Con: The Most Notorious Fakes, Frauds, and Forgeries in the Art World; Laney Salisbury and Aly Sujo, Provenance: How a Con Man and a Forger Rewrote the History of Modern Art; Noah Charney, The Art of Forgery: The Minds, Motives and Methods of Master Forgers; Thomas Hoving, False Impressions: The Hunt for Big-Time Art Fakes; and Michael Shnayerson, Boom: Mad Money, Mega Dealers, and the Rise of Contemporary Art.