Famous art forgers - From David Stein to Wolfgang Beltracchi

Delve into an intriguing part of the art market that often goes unmentioned - the world of famous art forgers. The individuals behind masterfully created art forgeries are often talented, intelligent and alluring people. Artalistic takes you on an insider’s look at the tumultuous lives of some of the world’s most famous art forgers, including Wolfgang Beltracchi, David Stein, Fernand Legros and Guy Ribes.

Wolfgang Beltracchi, Guy Ribes & Fernand Legros:  Three of the world’s most famous art forgers

Wolfgang Beltracchi: a notorious art forger

The German art forger Wolfgang Fischer - who later took the name of his wife, Hélène Beltracchi – was born in 1951. Beltracchi showed talent as an artist from an early age and was creating perfect forgeries of Picasso by the time he was 14. His father introduced him to the work of other famous artists, including Max Ernst, Georges Braque and Fernand Léger, as well as Surrealist and Expressionist painters.

The Bonnie & Clyde of art forgeries

Beltracchi did not copy paintings that already existed but created pieces he thought the painter would have painted, while his wife took care of the historical research, making sure that everything used in the forgeries was available at the time the painter would have painted it. The painstaking attention to detail and amount of research that went into the creation of these pieces is astonishing. Beltracchi stated that he channelled the painters in order to create his work, “Sometimes when I was painting I had the impression that they were looking over my shoulder.” He was finally caught because he used titanium white in a piece called Red Painting with Horses. This type of white paint was not used at the time the painting would have been created. Beltracchi confessed to having created 36 art forgeries that sold for $46 million. Although it is said that he has created over 300 forgeries. In 2011, Wolfgang Beltracchi was sentenced to six years in prison for counterfeiting and selling his art forgeries.

Guy Ribes: A superb conman

Guy Ribes is considered to be one of France's most famous art forgers. He started creating counterfeit paintings in the mid-1970s. Ribes began painting at the age of 16 and went on to create work that simulated the styles of great masters such as Matisse, Renoir, Modigliani and Chagall, using materials and paints from the period in which the original pieces would have been created.  

Uncovering the scam

Guy Ribes’ artistic genius allowed him to con gullible buyers. Ribes would give the pieces to an organized crime ring that would then sell them as authenticated pieces. He was caught red handed in 2005 and was brought to court in July 2010. He was sentenced to three years in prison (two of which were suspended). He went on to create his own art, which has been featured in exhibitions.

Fernand Legros: one of the most famous and flamboyant art forgers

Fernand Legros (1931-1983) was an American art dealer who was born in Egypt and later immigrated to France then the USA. He is known for his eccentric, shameless character. He is considered to be the greatest art forger of the second half of the twentieth century. After studying at the Louvre, Legros specialized in forging signatures. Legros met the painter Elmyr de Hory in Florida and for the next thirteen years Legros sold de Hory’s pieces to buyers around the world with his accomplice Real Lessard. De Hory made counterfeits that copied many of the great painters of the 20th century like Modigliani.

Fernand Legros: dealer of art forgeries and actor

Legros sold approximately 44 paintings to Algur H. Meadows, a Texas oilman, for more than $2 million. In 1967, the Art Dealers Association of America deemed these paintings to be fake. Legros hid from the authorities until 1973 when he was finally caught and brought to trial. He was sentenced to two years in jail for artistic fraud. Legros was not only known for his work as an art dealer but also stared in several French films during the late 1970s.

Other famous art forgers

Han van Meegeren

Han van Meegeren (1889-1947) specialized in forging Vermeers. Fascinated by the Dutch Golden Age, he began a career as a painter, but, disappointed by negative criticism and his lack of success, he decided to reproduce masterpieces. This led him to become one of the most famous art forgers of the 20^th century. The greatest experts of the time fell into his trap, as did several high-ranking Nazi dignitaries during the Second World War. After the war van Meegeren was arrested for selling Dutch cultural property to the Nazis. He confessed to the lesser crime of being an art forger and was convicted to one year in prison. However he died of a heart attack before serving out his sentence. It is estimated that he sold the equivalent of more than $30 million in art forgeries!

Yves Chaudron

A rather enigmatic person whose very existence is sometimes questioned, Yves Chaudron is associated with one of the greatest frauds in the history of art - the theft of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa in 1911. Chaudron was hired by the perpetrators to create six reproductions of the famous painting, which were sold in America. The real Mona Lisa was returned to the Louvre in 1913.

David Stein

David Stein (1935-1999) was a famous French art forger and dealer whose real name was Henri Abel Abraham Haddad. Using several other pseudonyms, he is recognized as one of the greatest art forgers of his time and spent a majority of his life trying to escape the law. He created remarkable copies of pieces by artists such as Picasso, Matisse, Klee and Chagall. Some of his forgeries were even exhibited at the MoMA in New York!