Gallery says Dutch master is fake

[snopes]

A painting long thought to be the work of Dutch master Vincent van Gogh has been proved a fake after a series of tests by art experts in Amsterdam.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/oddlyE...D4165620070803

[Floater]

Well, that wouldn't be the first time in the history of art, would it?

[MacLloyd]

Does it being a fake make it any less pleasurable to look at?

MacLloyd

Originally Posted by Floater

Well, that wouldn't be the first time in the history of art, would it?

And it won't be the last. I'd discuss this more but I think my canvas has been soaking in the bath of cold tea long enough.

[Aud 1]

Is it a fake or a misattribution. Van Gogh wasn't exactly all that during his lifetime. It is difficult to imagine someone deliberately trying to gain anything by copying him at that time. Now, student artists are often encouraged to copy others as practice but that's different from trying to fool a museum.

[Tootsie Plunkette]

Wow, this thread just took me on a trip down memory lane. Years ago, I was part of a community at AuctionWatch (now Vendio). Back in late 2000, someone started a thread about an auction of a (supposed) Van Gogh painting, Yellow Roses. And the fun began.

So, I did a search and was thrilled to find the original 25-page-long thread is still out there! Have fun reading, it slogs down at times (hard to keep track of the sock puppets), and most of the posted links are now dead-ends, but try to make it to the last two pages for the zinger. The painting in the OP here is also brought into the discussion a couple of times.

And the outcome.

A lot of people left the AW community when they changed hands and rules a year or so later, and I occasionally wonder what happened to some of those posters. Some of them, particularly HCQ, would be great snopesters! And maybe they are...

[Skeptic]

It's not a fake, merely attributed in error.

"The reattribution of paintings is part of the daily life in any major gallery with a large and complex collection," National Gallery of Victoria director Gerard Vaughan said on Friday.

[ganzfeld]

Originally Posted by Aud 1

Is it a fake or a misattribution. Van Gogh wasn't exactly all that during his lifetime. It is difficult to imagine someone deliberately trying to gain anything by copying him at that time. Now, student artists are often encouraged to copy others as practice but that's different from trying to fool a museum.

Because of his unique style, and the fact that the painting didn't appear until long after his death, I'm guessing that it is very unlikely to be a misattribution in this case.

Originally Posted by MacLloyd

Does it being a fake make it any less pleasurable to look at?

Of course not. Unless, of course, you want to know and understand the work of Van Gogh. It's not one of his more famous paintings but one that presumably people would view with the objective of understanding his draughtsmanship and the development of his unique style. It may still be a great painting but being a great work of art isn't enough to bring in millions. It also has to tell us something about something we care about. People care a lot more about the life and work of this popular painter than about the beauty of individual works or the quality of good fakes.

[ganzfeld]

Originally Posted by Skeptic

It's not a fake, merely attributed in error.

Your quote doesn't mean it wasn't a fake. "Reattribution" simply means giving the correct provenance or eliminating incorrect attributions. That doesn't mean the misattribution wasn't deliberate. (ETA - However, the BBC news is reporting that there isn't any evidence it was misattributed on purpose. So it looks like you're right even if your quote doesn't really show it.)