OH-Knoe-dler!
New York’s oldest art gallery, Knoedler & Company, made $80 million selling fake paintings over the course of fifteen years. The fraud consisted of a huge network of individuals to sell their fakes. A shady art dealer named Glafira Rosales provided Knoedler with forged paintings until she was arrested for tax evasion. She commissioned paintings from a man in New York and flipped them to the gallery as original paintings by famous abstract expressionist artists.
The Knoedler Gallery was a central force in the evolution of the art market in the United States. The gallery was located in a mansion at, “19 East 70th Street” [Vanity Fair] in New York City and it had existed for, “165 years” [Vanity Fair] ever since it was founded in …show more content…
Louis. She had started as a receptionist at the André Emmerich gallery (a rival of Knoedler) before moving to Knoedler in 1977. [Vanity Fair]
Freedman was introduced to Glafira Rosales through Jaime Andrade. The Ecuadoran-born Andrade had been around the gallery and art scene for decades and told Freedman that Rosales had art to bring in.
Glafira Rosales:
The woman who sold the paintings to the gallery came from Long Island and claimed to represent an unidentified owner called “Mr. X Jr.”. Rosales was also in charge of Glafira Rosales Fine Arts in Mahopac, New York. [Artnet] Rosales had one connection to phony art selling and that was to José Carlos Bergantinos Diaz. Diaz was an art consultant and collector from Spain. He operated a gallery in Manhattan with Rosales. Diaz was accused of trafficking in forgeries from at least 1999 according to court papers. [Artnet]
The first fake:
Rosales brought in a Rothko work that was done on paper. She had experts examine it, and after they confirmed it was real, she arranged its purchase. After the first painting was sold, Rosales continued to bring in works one at a time, and sold them for an agreed-upon flat …show more content…
Nasr had been working for over ten years on a Rothko catalogue raisonne. A letter sent from Nasr to Freedman on November 3rd, 2003, talked about Nasr’s visit from the Knoedler curator where she, “…especially enjoyed seeing…” the Rothko [Artnet].
Nasr noted she was planning on including an extra section to introduce new works on canvas that were discovered since the 1998 publication of the first volume of the catalogue. [Artnet] She added that if this section was published she intended to include the Rothko that came from Rosales. [Artnet]
Michael Hammer:
Michael Hammer has owned the Knoedler Gallery since 1991 when he inherited it from his grandfather. [Artnet] Hammer went almost entirely unmentioned during the coverage of the scandal. Hammer was never listed as a defendant in the lawsuit that was the central focus of the forgery debacle. Lagrange’s lawyers at the Dontzin Law Firm made it clear that they did not care if Hammer was specified as a part of the lawsuit. Hammer also runs Manhattan’s Hammer Galleries and is chairman emeritus of the Hammer Museum in L.A. Hammer has information that could be relevant to their case, and Lagrange’s lawyers have tried multiple times to subpoena it. Plus, Hammer voluntarily submitted an affidavit in December as part of a smaller hearing over Knoedler’s assets, which automatically
New York’s oldest art gallery, Knoedler & Company, made $80 million selling fake paintings over the course of fifteen years. The fraud consisted of a huge network of individuals to sell their fakes. A shady art dealer named Glafira Rosales provided Knoedler with forged paintings until she was arrested for tax evasion. She commissioned paintings from a man in New York and flipped them to the gallery as original paintings by famous abstract expressionist artists.
The Knoedler Gallery was a central force in the evolution of the art market in the United States. The gallery was located in a mansion at, “19 East 70th Street” [Vanity Fair] in New York City and it had existed for, “165 years” [Vanity Fair] ever since it was founded in …show more content…
Louis. She had started as a receptionist at the André Emmerich gallery (a rival of Knoedler) before moving to Knoedler in 1977. [Vanity Fair]
Freedman was introduced to Glafira Rosales through Jaime Andrade. The Ecuadoran-born Andrade had been around the gallery and art scene for decades and told Freedman that Rosales had art to bring in.
Glafira Rosales:
The woman who sold the paintings to the gallery came from Long Island and claimed to represent an unidentified owner called “Mr. X Jr.”. Rosales was also in charge of Glafira Rosales Fine Arts in Mahopac, New York. [Artnet] Rosales had one connection to phony art selling and that was to José Carlos Bergantinos Diaz. Diaz was an art consultant and collector from Spain. He operated a gallery in Manhattan with Rosales. Diaz was accused of trafficking in forgeries from at least 1999 according to court papers. [Artnet]
The first fake:
Rosales brought in a Rothko work that was done on paper. She had experts examine it, and after they confirmed it was real, she arranged its purchase. After the first painting was sold, Rosales continued to bring in works one at a time, and sold them for an agreed-upon flat …show more content…
Nasr had been working for over ten years on a Rothko catalogue raisonne. A letter sent from Nasr to Freedman on November 3rd, 2003, talked about Nasr’s visit from the Knoedler curator where she, “…especially enjoyed seeing…” the Rothko [Artnet].
Nasr noted she was planning on including an extra section to introduce new works on canvas that were discovered since the 1998 publication of the first volume of the catalogue. [Artnet] She added that if this section was published she intended to include the Rothko that came from Rosales. [Artnet]
Michael Hammer:
Michael Hammer has owned the Knoedler Gallery since 1991 when he inherited it from his grandfather. [Artnet] Hammer went almost entirely unmentioned during the coverage of the scandal. Hammer was never listed as a defendant in the lawsuit that was the central focus of the forgery debacle. Lagrange’s lawyers at the Dontzin Law Firm made it clear that they did not care if Hammer was specified as a part of the lawsuit. Hammer also runs Manhattan’s Hammer Galleries and is chairman emeritus of the Hammer Museum in L.A. Hammer has information that could be relevant to their case, and Lagrange’s lawyers have tried multiple times to subpoena it. Plus, Hammer voluntarily submitted an affidavit in December as part of a smaller hearing over Knoedler’s assets, which automatically