Naturally, the imitation is not always made for the purpose of cheating, but almost always with the hope of becoming as popular as a certain master by imitating his style. It is very often the work of pupils, as in the case of the Watteau imitations by Lancret and Pater.
It is known that the work of Paul Potter has been imitated by Klomp, that Jacob van Huysum has counterfeited the work of Breughel and of Wouwermans, that Constantin Netscher made plenty of money copying Vandyke Charles I portraits, and that Teniers the Younger sold false Titians.
To go back to prints and etchings before closing this chapter one must make a distinction between old imitations and modern ones. A good connoisseur is never at a loss to detect signs of counterfeit, but there is an essential difference of criterion needed in judging old imitations of etchings and modern imitations. In old prints involuntary discrepancies are sure to occur as they have been reproduced by hand, and the connoisseur must therefore be acquainted with them. These variations are more or less known to experts, whereas in the case of a modern purely mechanical reproduction, a magnifying glass and technical experience are the chief requirements. Marco Dente’s reproduction of Marcantonio’s work and the copies of Callot’s etchings by some of his pupils are examples of the imperfections of old imitations, details having been omitted.
CHAPTER XX
FAKED SCULPTURE, BAS-RELIEFS AND BRONZES
Faked sculpture—Clay work—The false Tanagras—Imitation of Renaissance work—Bas-reliefs and busts—Baked clay and stucco-duro—The Clodions—Bronzes—The importance of patina—The patina of Pompeiian bronzes and excavated bronzes—Renaissance patina and that of later times—Gilded bronzes—Marble work and its general colouring—Sculpture in wood and ivory—The Ceroplastica.
We must repeat that in sculpture also, faking borrows largely from the art of restoring. Indeed it is no exaggeration to say that nearly all branches of the faker’s art turn for help to the restorer’s methods. And here again, as in painting, we are also immediately confronted by two forms of trickery; one is the creation of a modern object in imitation of the antique so as to deceive the collector, and the other the reconstruction of some fantastic piece of forgery from an inferior object, or one greatly damaged by over-restoration. To speak of over-restoration is in such cases to use a euphemism. We can offer an example showing how this over-restoration of objects is nothing but a form of faking highly flavoured with different varieties of deception. A rich American bought a marble statue some years ago representing a famous Roman empress. It was bought not only because the Roman art appealed to him but as the portrait of that particular Roman empress. As a matter of fact, the whole statue had been faked by the addition of new portions to a headless, limbless torso, which was the only genuinely antique part. We must say, however, that the new head given to the half-faked statue was extremely well done. It had been copied from a well-known model and except that the patina of the marble was not so perfect as might have been expected from a great master in trickery, the most experienced collector might have been deceived.
Clay work is perhaps the most popular form of plastic art among the fakers of antiques. As it has the special advantage of being made from casts of originals, it does not present any real technical difficulty, and it demands no expensive additions and may be given colour and patina with comparative ease. Of course many of these advantages are also shared by bronzes, stucco, and all productions worked from an original model in clay or any other plastic substance, such as wax, pastiline, etc.
Tanagra figurines undoubtedly hold the first place in the large class of faked clay work. There has been an uninterrupted succession of forgers in this line from the time Tanagra work first came into fashion with collectors, to the stock imitations now sold in Paris and still bought for genuine Tanagras by over-naïve collectors. The old Baron Rothschild, who had a fine collection of Tanagra figurines and no small experience as a connoisseur, used to say that when it is a question of a Tanagra one must see it excavated, and even that nowadays is hardly a guarantee of genuineness.