DOI Artikel:
Miziołek, Jerzy: Introduction: Forgeries over the ages
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.23901#0013
INTRODUCTION
FORGERIES OVER THE AGES
A forgery of a work of art is an object falsely purporting to have the history
of production requisite for the work, (or an) original of the work
N. Goodman
In recent years there has been an increasing interest in faked works of art
and in all other kinds of falsifications. Prior to that, they had attracted the
interest of even the best known researchers - archaeologists and art
historians alike - including Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli, Bernard Ashmole,
Otto Kurz, John Pope-Hennessy and Andre Chastel2. While this interest
had resulted mainly in books and articles, in the last decade or so it has also
led to excellenty prepared exhibitions, at times organized by famous
museums, and international conferences on the subject3. One of the latter,
lasting several days, and devoted to various types of falsifications,
particularly in the field of literature and archives from the Middle Ages,
organized in 1986 in Munich by the Monumenta Germaniae Historica, gave
rise to a huge publication consisting of several volumes4. In an exhibition
held at the British Museum in 1990, the most famous faked artefacts
produced from Antiquity down to the beginning of the 20th century were
put on display5. The Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, the Musee d'Art et
d'Histoire in Geneva, and the Museo Poldi Pezzoli in Milan also held
exhibitions which contributed considerably to our knowledge on this
subject6. The Paris show was devoted mainly to forgeries of works of art
from Antiquity, specifically coins and small bronzes, while the one in
Geneva focussed on falsifications of paintings and sculptures from the
Italian late Middle Ages and Renaissance. Both exhibitions were based, to
a large extent, on works belonging to the institutions in which they were
held. To some degree these displays represented a real turning point in
scholars' and museologist's attitudes to forgeries. Discussing openly
forgeries thus ceased to be a taboo, even in museums where such works had
been acquired as originals. One of the authors of the introduction to the
exhibition held in the Bibliotheque Nationale even felt himself able to claim
that: „le faux n'existe plus"7.
Fakes, which are present in the majority of collections and museums
all over the world, appears now to be almost as fascinating both to the experts
and general public as original works of art. On the one hand they provide
9
FORGERIES OVER THE AGES
A forgery of a work of art is an object falsely purporting to have the history
of production requisite for the work, (or an) original of the work
N. Goodman
In recent years there has been an increasing interest in faked works of art
and in all other kinds of falsifications. Prior to that, they had attracted the
interest of even the best known researchers - archaeologists and art
historians alike - including Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli, Bernard Ashmole,
Otto Kurz, John Pope-Hennessy and Andre Chastel2. While this interest
had resulted mainly in books and articles, in the last decade or so it has also
led to excellenty prepared exhibitions, at times organized by famous
museums, and international conferences on the subject3. One of the latter,
lasting several days, and devoted to various types of falsifications,
particularly in the field of literature and archives from the Middle Ages,
organized in 1986 in Munich by the Monumenta Germaniae Historica, gave
rise to a huge publication consisting of several volumes4. In an exhibition
held at the British Museum in 1990, the most famous faked artefacts
produced from Antiquity down to the beginning of the 20th century were
put on display5. The Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, the Musee d'Art et
d'Histoire in Geneva, and the Museo Poldi Pezzoli in Milan also held
exhibitions which contributed considerably to our knowledge on this
subject6. The Paris show was devoted mainly to forgeries of works of art
from Antiquity, specifically coins and small bronzes, while the one in
Geneva focussed on falsifications of paintings and sculptures from the
Italian late Middle Ages and Renaissance. Both exhibitions were based, to
a large extent, on works belonging to the institutions in which they were
held. To some degree these displays represented a real turning point in
scholars' and museologist's attitudes to forgeries. Discussing openly
forgeries thus ceased to be a taboo, even in museums where such works had
been acquired as originals. One of the authors of the introduction to the
exhibition held in the Bibliotheque Nationale even felt himself able to claim
that: „le faux n'existe plus"7.
Fakes, which are present in the majority of collections and museums
all over the world, appears now to be almost as fascinating both to the experts
and general public as original works of art. On the one hand they provide
9