Very interesting article by George Hagenauer about 1980s original art forgeries

[*paull*]

http://www.comicartfans.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1613

[Thomas]

Wow that was a good read.

 

Thanks for posting it.

[jjeanius]

This stuff amazes me. Actually, the whole history of the hobby, what with all of the stolen artwork, etc, etc...is extremely interesting. Just one of the reasons I'm glad I collect modern art. ;-)

[*paull*]

That Frank Paul piece is not an easy thing to forge. I'm surprised that the forger chose such difficult pieces.

[tth2]

That Frank Paul piece is not an easy thing to forge. I'm surprised that the forger chose such difficult pieces.

Actually, sometimes the most complex pieces with lots of detail are the best candidates for forging, because the amount of detail is so overwhelming that a buyer won't do a painstaking comparison. Kind of like hiding in plain sight.

 

Given the massive increases in OA prices, I'm surprised forgery hasn't become more prevalent. After all:

 

1. it's easy to recreate because anyone can buy a printed cover and then lightbox it

 

2. a lot of OA might not exist, or if it does, has only been seen by a few people, so might not be easily identified as a forgery; classic case is KK's alleged X-Men #1 cover OA, which he won't allow anyone to see; if he ever DOES produce it, how will people know if it's real or not, if no one else has ever seen it?

 

3. there are literally thousands of artists in China, Vietnam and Thailand who crank out knock-offs of famous paintings for pennies; with some training and practice, they would be able to knock out perfect reproductions of OA; all you'd have to do is get aged art boards to them

[aardvark88]

Great article by George H.

 

Seems like there were several fake Frazetta pen/ink illos created in the late 70s also. Some went thru the hands of a collector/dealer named Greenberg. Not sure if this is the same person that ran the Greenberg comicons in the 70s advertised in Alan Light's TBG pre-CBG.