An art forger and his three accomplices, who made at least 10 million euros ($14 million) by selling oil paintings they falsely attributed to famous artists, were today sentenced to a total of 15 years in prison by a court in Cologne.
Wolfgang Beltracchi, 60, was sentenced to 6 years in jail after he confessed to painting 14 works that he sold as masterpieces by Max Ernst, Max Pechstein, Heinrich Campendonk, Andre Derain, Fernand Leger and Kees van Dongen.
His wife, Helene Beltracchi, got a 4-year term; her sister, named by the court as Jeanette S., was handed a 21-month suspended sentence; and a fourth associate, Otto Schulte- Kellinghaus, was given 5 years at the Cologne regional court.
“Beltracchi was the guiding spirit, who brought the others in, even if they came willingly,” Wilhelm Kremer, the presiding judge at the trial, told the court. The scam was “organized in great detail, you could say with military precision,” he said.
Dealers and collectors say confidence in the German art market has been shaken by the forgery scandal, described as the biggest ever in Germany, as art historians, museums and auction houses were duped by the fake pictures.
On the side of the victims, “there was a great deal of frivolity in buying the paintings, which had perhaps something to do with the gains that could be made,” Kremer said. He pointed out that galleries and auction houses had sold the forgeries on to collectors at vast profit.
“No serious tests and investigations were conducted,” he said.
Steve Martin
Among the forgers’ victims was the U.S. actor Steve Martin, according to a May report in Spiegel magazine. Martin paid 700,000 euros for a painting falsely attributed to Heinrich Campendonk, called “Landscape With Horses,” from Galerie Cazeau- Beraudiere in Paris in 2004, according to Spiegel.
It was then sold by Christie’s in 2006 for 500,000 euros to a Swiss businesswoman, the magazine said. Christie’s spokesman Matthew Paton declined to comment on the sale.
“The whole thing is quite terrible,” said Christoph Graf Douglas, a Frankfurt-based independent art dealer and consultant to collectors. “It has completely undermined confidence in the market. Not only were criminals at work, there was also some shoddy research. People have bought the idea that experts can detect forgeries, and this shows that is not the case.”
Site by Artimin
