Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1901-03-23
not just as happy with false objects as with

not just as happy with false objects as with
In America the bogus products will not
| be lonely. Our public and private galleries
are full of limitations. All Europe is full of
limitations. AS for the old masters of paint
ing In the last forty years Belgium alone
has created hundreds of Hobbemas Teniers.
Mierfs. Metzus and Ruysdaels. not to speak
OF Van Goyens and otners who have more
lately come into fashion The Belgian
fraud is almost as important that OF
Paris, while Italy makes a good third.
could hardly believe that real amateurs
could be deceived, and / said to this young
Frenchman the first time l was presented:
But suppose l take an authentic little We
ronese, for example. 1t belongs TO friend
Of mine and l have often examined it. l
canvass venerable with age, 10 be per-
suaded of its genuineneSs.
Art of Making Old Masters
THAT is no proof he answered, and then
he said a few words on the art Of making
old masters. For a few dollars l can buy
an authentic old picture, an awfully bad
one, ruined by time and weather and after
a proper kind of washing l can have the old
master painted on it by one of my artists.
1t VIII be genuine canvas of the epoch,
won it? Or, If / do not want to take this
trouble, can maroutier my bogus old mas
ter on a genuine old canvas Maroufe is
the name of an extremely strong and teua-
clous kind of paste. The ancient look is
through the oven. 1t is baked like a crust.
and If the little scales are not numerous
enough my man will scratch up some more
/ with pin point. The rich colorings of age
the old browns and yellows, are obtained by
various washes, one of which has common
| ilcorlce for its base. IL is rubbed in with
the palm Of the hand, to give a warm and
golden tone. Old stains are made with wa
ter, slightly gummed and tinted with sepia
and Chinese ink. Then a little brush is
| dipped In this liquid, the hairs of the brush
| mlSSed nd ha
allowed to drop in fine drops on the picture
| mere ana there to produce the pointile
Whlch certain amateurs imag CINE to be in
imltaole The hard enamel of time can be
Initiated by covering lie whole painting
with slight wash of liquid gum. The al
sheet of glass"
But how can your copyists reproduce
the delicate contours and majestic drap-
cries Of the old masters?'
Il tell you" he replied, that there are
copyists whose talent is no less real than
deplorable. If they cannot seize the de-
tails always, they at least get the ensem-
Die OF composition. As for the details
you have heard Of writer's who when not
sure of the spelling of a word make a
blot. Well, these painters can do the same
| thing. By rubbing the spot with a wet
| handkerchief moisture is left on it which
| soon produces microscopic, mushroom-like
| vegetation. Left to mature and die out
they form just the kind of blots an old
master would be likely to suffer from in
chanci As for signatures, their specialists
are called monOgramiStS, and they know
all the signatures of every great painter
now they changed at various periods of his
career, and all the rest. They Will nut I'm
the signature and then almost cover it, so
that the buyer may have the pleasure of
discovering 1t himSef-and proving its gem
uineness!
America Full of Bogus Art
The United States is all the more likely
to be full Of bogus art because of the high
prices paid by American collectors Thirty
or forty years ago quantities of talented
out poor artists passed their lives making
splendid copies of the pleasing paintings of
GreuZe, Vatican, Lancret and Pater The
originals We're plentiful then and they had
only TO reproduce what they could see But
later, when the prices Of these originals
Went up so tremendously, and the originals
We're retired to the private galleries OF
rlch men. the imitators no longer could
copy them, especially their coioring They
We're obliged to do chic COPY from en-
cravings and other copies. Beside their
later work, the copies made thirty years
ago look like originals-and sell like them,
too.
The amusing part of it is that bogus old
masters date not only from our own time.
Louis XIV had an expert, Mignard in
whom he had perfect confidence On Mig
nard 8 advice he bought a pretended Guido
painted in reality by Boulogne who made
q specially of GuidoS Good painters often
have done this trickery to get money ami
secretly to triumph in their naughty skill
fulness. Paul Potters have been initiated
by Albert hlomp, Snyders by Paul de Vos,
Johann van de BredaS by Breughel dc We
lours and Jean van Huysums by Jacob van
Huysum. Luca Giordano inundated the gal
lerles of Europe with various limitations;
and David TenierS, one OF those ofteuest
| initiated today, did not hesitate to initiate
Titan, whose style he caught wonderfully
At the famous Hamilton sale the London
expert, Thomas Woods, offered for genuine
RnhpnS catalOp7lp0 bp balp
to Charles j, a Daniel in the Den Of Lions
1t is one of the rare paintings he said,
known to have been executed entirely by
the hand of Rubens. Nevertheless a few
days before the sale the rumor got about
that another Daniel I'm the Den of Lions
by Rubens was in existence. 1t was found
in a church in the Isle of Wight. Nobody
knows today which is the original-if
either
Everybody knows how the great collector
the Marquis de Latour-Dupin, was taken in.
A Paris expert of a certain reputation came
to him and confided in great secrecy the
whereabouts Of three Watteaus. They were
the property Of a woman in reduced cir
cumStaSceS, a Nine Gigault. The marquis
finally paid 100000 francs for the three For
ten years he enjoyed their possession as
genuine works by Vatican. Then one day
a dispute concerning them arose between
himself and a friend. Three great experts
were called in, who on sight pronounced
them to be base limitations. The three have
been recently sold for 5000.
Charles jacques Adventure.
This adventure happened to the famous
animal painter Charles Jacque, who died
only a few years ago: A friend and admirer
of his paintings meeting him morning
said:
Dear master, I have just bought one of
your pictures for $500 francs
(Which one?" asked JacQue. II shouid
"WHO PAYS THE PIPE