Waterbury evening Democrat., 1904-11-09
OLD PRINTS.
Many Sold as Such Are Frauds-How
 They Are Made.

:
 Many Sold as Such Are Frauds How
 They Are Made.
 People have no conception of the immense amount of fraud there is in the print trade" said Tom Cotton, representative of Frost & Read. art publishers of London and Bristol, who is at the Fifth Avenue This firm does business with most of the leading art dealers in this country. Tt is no ex- aggeration to say,' continued MT. Cot ton, that of every ten old engravings
 which are iealously treasured and proudly shown in hundreds of homes, both here and in England, nine are
 spurious, and in many cases I should have grave doubts about the tenth.
 You must, remember that many of these engravings have cost more than really good paintings. Many of them have, in fact, cost scores and hundreds of dollars, and in at least one case, a single engraving has cost SIP, 500.
 ..The process of faking is usually simple. The. genuine old prints are reproduced by process, or if necessary, are re-engrayed and the requisite ap- pearance of old age is given by sleeping
 or washing them in burnt sienna, cof fee, or some similar c0loring medium.
 They are of course, placed in old 1 frames, and are sent usually to country sales, where they naturally assume the innocent guise of treasured neirlooms. The art lover who can thus pick up Morland or Duref for a few dollars thinks himself a very lucky man, and as he has perhaps no need or wish to Ip part with the purchase, he is never lundeceived In many cases the en-, cravings are printed from the original blocks, and to that extent are genuine But the blocks are probably worn or faulty and it requires all the ingenuity l of the trained faker to conceal the de- l fects.
 'tBut there is usually no limit to his skill. He gets hold of 3a tattered copy; 1 of a trimmed print, and he will put q ] fresh margin on it of suitable material l and appearance, uniting the margin with the print so cleyerly that no eye
 can detect the joint. He will repro
 duce paper mark, fill in defective I places in the paper, work up faint
 parts of the impressions with India
 ink, and generally produce print
 which is perfect example of we'll preserved original impression, ana \ worth many times as much as the
 print which came into his hands. Ei"Old engraving should never be l bought except from the best firms in 1 the business.
 .'In the case of paintings the frauds l perpetrated are as numerous as en-
 cravings. I could get you admirable l samples of any old master or any
 school of painting frRmv certain places 1 in London, all propefE ksigned, and
 certainly beyoud the kbW6F of any but an expert to detect. . In London, as in I New York, men are constantly engaged Eand many of them exceedingly clever 1 if unlucky or .unprincipled artists in
 turning out Raphaels, Turner's, and l Tintorettos by scores and hundreds. These artists. however, are far more
 numerous in London than here.
 ssOf course, such fraudulent dealings injure the legitimate trade, and those
 who go in for the highest price picture collecting cannot be too loudly warned against making their purchases except Of the most reputable and reasonable I dealers. .''--New Cork Globe.) 1