Fake Modigliani seized, was about to be put up for sale: here's how it was discovered

Discovered a fake Modigliani drawing that was about to be put up for sale: the counterfeit work emerged thanks to the work of the Venice Cultural Heritage Protection Unit , which this morning delivered the paper to the Roma Tre University’s Laboratory on Fakes. The affair began in April 2022, when the drawing, a Caryatid, was submitted to the Export Office of the Soprintendenza Archeologia, Belle Arti e Paesaggio for the Municipality of Venice and the Lagoon by a Venetian sector company to apply for the Attestato di Libera Circolazione (A.L.C.), or the document that allows a work of art of cultural interest to leave national borders.

The work was presented as an Untitled drawing by Amedeo Modigliani dated to the first half of 1913, pencil on paper, measuring 51 x 73 x 3 centimeters, with a declared value of 300 thousand euros. Ever since it was presented, the sheet raised the doubts of the Export Commission, which was puzzled by both the technical aspects of the drawing and its stylistic aspects. In addition, the company applying for the export permit provided the Export Office with little information about the work’s provenance.

The drawing was first subjected to technical analysis with Wood’s lamp and infrared (IR) reflectography on the back as well, after which the commission proceeded with a stylistic analysis, with the help of the Gallerie dell’Accademia in Venice, the State Museums Directorate of the City of Rome and the Scuola Normale Superiore of Pisa, and it emerged that the drawing in question corresponded almost exactly to another Modigliani caryatid drawing belonging to the Museum of Art in Philadelphia, to which it had been donated in 1943 by collector Arthur Wiesenberger. Compared to the Philadelphia drawing, however, the one presented to the Venice Superintendency has a much more uncertain and coarse stroke, obvious disproportions in some details (the nose, for example), a much smaller head size.

As early as July 2022, therefore, the Superintendency alerted the Carabinieri, who launched the investigation, directed by the Venice Public Prosecutor’s Office. As early as August 2022 the work had been judged to be counterfeit, so the Carabinieri of the Venice Nucleo Tutela Patrimonio Culturale seized the work and reconstructed the history of the drawing. The Venetian firm that had requested the certificate from the Superintendency had acted on behalf of a prestigious Paris auction house, as reconstructed by investigators. The auction house was in turn acting on behalf of an Abruzzo-based gallery of ancient art, which had presented itself to the Ministry of Culture as the owner of the work. The Carabinieri had instead ascertained that the gallery in question had also been ’mandated to sell’ by a private individual domiciled in Abruzzo. The latter had received the painting as a gift from his adoptive father, who in turn had purchased it from an additional Abruzzo art gallery that had long since closed.

For further technical verification of the drawing, the Venice Carabinieri turned to the “Laboratory on Fakes. Center for the study of countering the forgery of cultural goods and works of art” at the University of Roma Tre, which has consolidated experience in the field and effective collaboration with the Comando Tutela Patrimonio Culturale. Same conclusion: in January 2023, at the end of the investigation, the Laboratory ruled out that it was an authentic work by Modigliani.

The investigation thus identified conceivable criminal liability against a person, who was reported for putting a counterfeit work of art into circulation, a crime introduced into the Criminal Code by Law 22/2022, already provided for in the Code of Cultural Heritage and Landscape. In February 2024, at the end of the activities, the drawing was then confiscated and assigned to the University of Roma Tre’s Laboratory on Fakes, according to current regulations, which require the confiscation of counterfeited, altered or reproduced works of art without authorization, unless they are things belonging to persons unrelated to the crime.

Fake Modigliani seized, was about to be put up for sale: here's how it was discovered

Warning: the translation into English of the original Italian article was created using automatic tools. We undertake to review all articles, but we do not guarantee the total absence of inaccuracies in the translation due to the program. You can find the original by clicking on the ITA button. If you find any mistake,please contact us.