Forgery: Modern Art’s Biggest Problem

Stephanie Clegg, an art collector, paid Sotheby’s $90,000 for a Marc Chagall watercolor about 10 years ago. Recently, she sent it to an authentication panel in France that declared it a fake. When Clegg complained to Sotheby’s, they told her that their guarantee of authenticity lasted only five years, but said they would give her a credit of $18,500 on future sales. She said no. She wants $175,000. (Source: The New York Times)

In the book I’m writing on collecting art as an investment, I’m devoting a chapter to the problem of forgeries. Fake Rembrandts and Vermeers have troubled the market forever, but in the last 50 years, fakes have become commonplace. That’s because modern art is much easier to forge and more difficult to detect. The good news: This is a problem that will go away. Within the next decade, all museum-grade art will be sold with accompanying NFTs that will render forgery obsolete.