Gallery owner arrested for forged and stolen Ansel Adams photographs

[Drew Wiley]

Kincade infamously mass-produced fancy "posters" assembly-line fashion, then would personally add one or two tiny spots of paint on them to claim they were original paintings, and sell them under false pretenses. That's like waving a red flag at a bull when it comes to art fraud laws in both CA and NY. But his whole overall marketing strategy was basically a fashion of investment fraud at a certain point in his career, and, without going into details or nitpicking that statement, is what finally got him indicted. Peter Lik is basically the photographer equivalent; but he's mainly based in Las Vegas and Lahaina, and has been known to wave a lot of red flags of his own. But every tourist trap gallery row potentially has some version of that kind of nonsense. New Yorkers know better, so prefer to get defrauded by better fakes. The temptation to mass-produce counterfeits (valuable manuscripts, at least) goes clear back to the invention of wood block presses. All kinds of technology has been pioneered by crooks.

[jnantz]

Kincade infamously mass-produced fancy "posters" assembly-line fashion, then would personally add one or two tiny spots of paint on them to claim they were original paintings, and sell them under false pretenses. That's like waving a red flag at a bull when it comes to art fraud laws in both CA and NY. But his whole overall marketing strategy was basically a fashion of investment fraud at a certain point in his career, and, without going into details or nitpicking that statement, is what finally got him indicted. Peter Lik is basically the photographer equivalent; but he's mainly based in Las Vegas and Lahaina, and has been known to wave a lot of red flags of his own. But every tourist trap gallery row potentially has some version of that kind of nonsense. New Yorkers know better, so prefer to get defrauded by better fakes. The temptation to mass-produce counterfeits (valuable manuscripts, at least) goes clear back to the invention of wood block presses. All kinds of technology has been pioneered by crooks.

don't really think any of them are frauds they all did / do whatever they can to sell their work.
a lot of photographers don't print their own work, are they frauds?
not sure what the difference between Lik, Adams and Kincade are.
All seem to be idealized landscapists/primevilists to me.
Is your comment a "taste" / "insult" thing?

[Alan Klein]

Many artists copy their art on silk screens or other methods and then add paint strokes to each of the results and sign them personally. This is well-known and perfectly legal. Buyers know what they're buying. Of course, the original all-oil painting goes for a lot more. It's no different than a photographer having a limited edition of his photo.

[nitroplait]

Bob Dylan apparently also used photographs as "inspiration" for his paintings:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/did-b...f-cla_b_985296

[jnantz]

Bob Dylan apparently also used photographs as "inspiration" for his paintings:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/did-b...f-cla_b_985296

is this bad ? people use other people's tripod holes, and emulate other people's style ( with a camera ) all the time, is that bad too ?

[Tin Can]

Exactly

There is a saying

'We stand on the shoulders of giants!'

Some also believe in Synchronicity

or

Nothing new under the Sun

many here emulate

[Drew Wiley]

Alan - you're missing the point. A photomechanical press reproduction of a painting is not legally an original painting; nor is something based on a paint-by-numbers map filled in with colors in another country by an assembly line of workmen. Even the legal definition of a serigraph (silkscreen) or lithograph has certain stipulations, and technique-inherent quantity limits, different from mechanically mass-produced things like posters, whether they're done cheaply or good. Things go terribly awry otherwise. For example, Dali signed stacks of blank paper even on his deathbed, without even seeing the end result, which was in fact, thousands of ordinary posters of his work, which ended up selling for high prices due to his own signature, but which inevitably proved almost worthless to gullible collectors who thought they were getting a sound investment.

"Investment" is the deceptive hook in the bait. It's what one hears, or at least distinctly implied, walking into a Lik gallery, and what got Kincade into a lot of trouble. If you just happen to like a particular gernre and want it on your walls, and don't mind spending the money, fine. But there are legal limits to what the seller can claim about it before transgressing the boundary of fraud. What finally bagged Kincade was the manner his franchisees became defrauded; but he had been waving a red flag at a bull all along, failing to notice another angry bull was also watching.

There's certainly nothing wrong with the manner Kincade came up with an especially high quality manner of making reproductions, or even offering those in custom colorized fashion to match specific client decor (though it's not to my own taste). Rather, it was when he got highly successful and overextended himself, and like numerous others before, was facing financial collapse to his oversized house of cards, which by then included his own theme-park-like real estate venture, that he finally overstepped the line conspicuously enough to get into real trouble. But he had been flirting with that fate for quite awhile, as if almost teasing authorities.

[jnantz]

Alan - you're missing the point. A photomechanical press reproduction of a painting is not legally an original painting; nor is something based on a paint-by-numbers map filled in with colors in another country by an assembly line of workmen. Even the legal definition of a serigraph (silkscreen) or lithograph has certain stipulations, and technique-inherent quantity limits, different from mechanically mass-produced things like posters, whether they're done cheaply or good. Things go terribly awry otherwise. For example, Dali signed stacks of blank paper even on his deathbed, without even seeing the end result, which was in fact, thousands of ordinary posters of his work, which ended up selling for high prices due to his own signature, but which inevitably proved almost worthless to gullible collectors who thought they were getting a sound investment.

"Investment" is the deceptive hook in the bait. It's what one hears, or at least distinctly implied, walking into a Lik gallery, and what got Kincade into a lot of trouble. If you just happen to like a particular gernre and want it on your walls, and don't mind spending the money, fine. But there are legal limits to what the seller can claim about it before transgressing the boundary of fraud. What finally bagged Kincade was the manner his franchisees became defrauded; but he had been waving a red flag at a bull all along, failing to notice another angry bull was also watching.

There's certainly nothing wrong with the manner Kincade came up with an especially high quality manner of making reproductions, or even offering those in custom colorized fashion to match specific client decor (though it's not to my own taste). Rather, it was when he got highly successful and overextended himself, and like numerous others before, was facing financial collapse to his oversized house of cards, which by then included his own theme-park-like real estate venture, that he finally overstepped the line conspicuously enough to get into real trouble. But he had been flirting with that fate for quite awhile, as if almost teasing authorities.

Dali was a fraud too ? and collectors who buy signed artwork are gullible ?
I think it would be easier if you could tell us who you believe WASN'T a fraud, naive and gullible. it might be easier
you didn't answer my question about people who seek out other people's style or tripod holes and sell the work as their own
are they frauds, or just everyone else ?

[Bernice Loui]

All this brings up another "art world" personality.. Andy Warhol... copier or originator or ?_?_?_?


Bernice

[Drew Wiley]

... mostly a monotonous abomination as far as I'm concerned. A Starbucks on every street corner, but even more Warhols, ad nauseum. I'd pay to join any modern art museum which refuses to show him and offers something fresh instead. An illustrator of common commodities who became just another common commodity.