Evgeni, Michail and Semyon

November 17, 2016 12:50 PM

"In 2001, Belgian police called curators at one of London’s top museums and told them that two J.M.W. Turner paintings valued at $35 million had been recovered in a sting operation. Lost since 1994, the Tate Gallery scrambled to get a professional down to Antwerp to see them. Sitting at home in Berlin a few days later, Evgeni Posin was reading an article in the newspaper about two men arrested for trying to pass off the Turners as original. He knew immediately the paintings were fakes. How? Because he and his two brothers had painted them."
Evgeni Posin works with his two brothers Michail and Semyon in Berlin. They are originally from Russia. The three are the first family of Art Forgery.

Take a peek into their website.
Would you like to know more? Here's a short 1-min video clip which will help you get to know them.


Want more? Here's a longer German doc. which goes into their studio in Neukölln to watch them at work (German not necessary; the visuals are likely enough)

Would you like to see some of their paintings? Their Mona Lisa perhaps? Then I suggest you take a holiday to a small hotel in East Germany. The owner of the hotel is their biggest collector and their paintings, master copies of the some of the worlds greatest Art, are on display.

posted by vacapinta (14 comments total)

How much would it cost me to buy a replica of the Mona Lisa that's good enough to fool the experts?
posted by Foci for Analysis at 12:58 PM on November 17, 2016 [3 favorites]

At minimum, a buck plus shipping for a post card.
posted by Greg_Ace at 1:14 PM on November 17, 2016

"How much would it cost me to buy a replica of the Mona Lisa that's good enough to fool the experts?"


You want a Mona Lisa forgery? I can get you a Mona Lisa forgery, believe me. There are ways, dude. You don't wanna know about it, believe me.

Hell, I can get you a Mona Lisa forgery by 3 o'clock this afternoon... with a frame. These fucking amateurs...
posted by I-baLL at 1:30 PM on November 17, 2016 [2 favorites]

Looking forward to checking the links. Just to say, this post reminded me of a comment made by my primary school teacher about 30 years ago, about a great series that was on TV at the time, where a famous forger talks about how to create copies of different artists' work. I just found it - his name was Tom Keating and serendipitously, episode 1 is on Turner
posted by iotic at 1:34 PM on November 17, 2016 [1 favorite]

look i want the best forgery

a forgery so good that da vinci himself would close down his tumblr

maybe i even want a monet and a picasso to hang on the fridge

make this happen people
posted by Foci for Analysis at 2:22 PM on November 17, 2016 [1 favorite]

If you should ever find yourself in Vienna, there is a museum of art forgeries that is absolutely fantastic for a labor-of-love basement museum. They have some original forgeries and a little library, but their guidebook tells the story of a few different forgers woven throughout the progress of the 20th century. Some of the forgeries went for astonishing amounts of money after they were revealed to be forgeries by a famous forger.

radicalspouse and I were there on our honeymoon and saw a ton of museums, but that was one of our favorites.

It's just across the street from the Hundertwasserhaus, which was also a must-see.
posted by radicalawyer at 2:47 PM on November 17, 2016 [5 favorites]

That's a pretty good story and all, but the most astonishing thing in it is that the Tate Gallery had been lost since 1994.
posted by key_of_z at 4:13 PM on November 17, 2016 [5 favorites]

Not really lost. Apparently the Tate was down in Antwerp getting professional help.
posted by mono blanco at 8:55 PM on November 17, 2016

The only Mona Lisa I want is the one that has THIS IS A FAKE written on the canvas.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 12:13 AM on November 18, 2016

John Myatt's Forger's Masterclass is good fun as well.
posted by sebastienbailard at 1:40 AM on November 18, 2016

They have some original forgeries…

Well, you certainly wouldn't want any fake forgeries in a museum!
posted by TedW at 8:09 AM on November 18, 2016 [1 favorite]

Likely won't fool an expert, Foci for Analysis, but maybe good enough to fool your friends for $32 + shipping?

(I recalled that there were shops in China that would, er, reproduce classical paintings, and a quick google came up with a HuffPo article, from where the first link was gleaned. I'm sure there are a lot of other fine art reproduction shops out there.)

--

No, TedW, you belong in a museum!
posted by porpoise at 2:28 PM on November 18, 2016

Well, I am a bit of a fossil.
posted by TedW at 3:07 PM on November 18, 2016 [1 favorite]

Ha! Not that I recommend it especially, but I'm listening to Tom Wolfe's Back to Blood, with a big plot point about a Russian art forger.
posted by MtDewd at 6:02 PM on November 19, 2016