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Post a Comment On: Steve Sailer: iSteve

"Eric Hebborn as Eric Hebborn"

17 Comments -

1 – 17 of 17
Anonymous Chris said...

Steve - Have you seen the incredibly self-indulgent but somehow entertaining Orson Welles movie "F is for Fake!"?

5/11/08, 5:41 PM

Anonymous airtommy said...

American robber barons

Ahem, don't you mean "hard-working industrialists"?

:-)

5/11/08, 6:39 PM

Anonymous SFG said...

What do you mean there's no proof, it was the subject of one of the best Dr. Who serials! :)

Ahem, don't you mean "hard-working industrialists"?
Paleocons aren't required to like business, I think. ;)

5/11/08, 7:12 PM

Blogger Michael said...

Fun. You might enjoy Dutton's (one "n" in Denis, btw) book about forgers and forgery too. It's first-rate.

5/11/08, 7:57 PM

Blogger C. Van Carter said...

Someone dodgy telling you "it's an early X, before he developed his exquisite mature style" should be enough to determine an artwork is a forgery, without even looking at it.

I second the recommendation of "F is for Fake"

5/11/08, 9:40 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Steve, in your art entries you should consider informing readers that the art market is booming in the midst of our macro economic crisis because artwork is an extreme flight to safety for investors similar to gold or jewelry.

In other words, the savvy in America are hedging against the dollar. This is the most important story in the 2008 art world. When a currency crashes...the smart money owns farmland, precious metals, jewelry and works of art.

The dumb money stands around and asks "...what happened?"

5/11/08, 10:56 PM

Blogger Tino said...

“You are paying to own something that was touched by Raphael.”

Makes sense. But I would also add some economics to it: you are paying for (investing in) an asset that through its nature guaranteed to be fixed in supply.

Raphael + Raphael’s unique idea can never be duplicated and driven down in price, but some good painter imitating Raphael can.

5/11/08, 10:58 PM

Blogger Thursday said...

When it comes to art there are two things that make it valuable: its aesthetic value and status value. The two are not the same, and as the first is sometimes inaccessible to all but the most sensitive and talented, the latter will often take over.

5/12/08, 8:17 AM

Anonymous Simon Oliver Lockwood said...

"If this small sketch was so beautiful it was worth a million dollars when it was a Raphael, why isn't it worth anything now that it's a Hebborn?"

For the same reason the baseball that Barry Bonds hit his 756th home run is worth much more than a baseball that Ray Durham fouled off 3 innings before. Historic art is basically memorabilia.

5/12/08, 12:34 PM

Blogger Kai Carver said...

A long time ago at a dinner party in Paris, I argued that museums are inherently undemocratic, because they restrict access to people who can afford to travel to certain geographic locations, wait in long lines, and pay high ticket prices. I suggested money should be invested to make excellent forgeries so people in any major population center could enjoy the experience of seeing the world's greatest artworks. A museum could sell one of its precious Old Masters and use the money to make excellent copies of 50 others. Technology can probably help to make this increasingly cheap and repeatable.

Reaction was uniformly negative. I kept asking, if most people can't distinguish between a high-quality reproduction and the original, isn't that good enough? Eventually, an attractive woman told me, in a pitying tone: "You have a terrible relation to matter" (it sounded better in French). That shut me up.

But as I think about it years later, far from those withering eyes, I think I had a point! Of course, if museums started to apply such a policy, the high art market would tank.

5/12/08, 2:03 PM

Blogger J. said...

Thanks for the tip on this Hebborn dude.

I looked him up and apparently his books are very popular among art students. who better to teach art than a great forger?

5/12/08, 2:20 PM

Blogger KlaosOldanburg said...

seeing this reminded me of the art coverage here at isteve:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24068892/

(who needs satire when reality is this absurd?)

5/12/08, 11:30 PM

Anonymous David said...

"F for Fake" is brilliant on many levels. You could study that movie forever.

"Go on singing!" Wonderful!

5/13/08, 7:52 AM

Anonymous savvygoper said...

Steve, I notice that you like to refer to Raphael in art conversations, and that you have read Paul Johnson's Art: A New History. I've read it as well and Johnson gives the impression, not verbatim, that he considers Raphael the greatest artist ever. Do you agree with his assessment?

5/16/08, 12:10 AM

Blogger Steve Sailer said...

Thanks for asking, but the more I study the history of art the more I see that to offer a legitimate personal opinion on something like who was the greatest, you have to be able to draw well enough to attempt copies of the great painters' works so you can see the problems they overcame. I can't draw very well, so I'm not going to offer a personal opinion.

I would note, however, that Raphael would seem reasonably comparable to Mozart, who died at 35, two years younger than Raphael. Music scholars have amused themselves speculating on what Mozart would have composed if he'd lived his three score and ten (an opera of "Faust" with a libretto by Goethe?), and most seem to believe it would unquestionably have been the greatest body of work by any composer.

On the other hand, Beethoven was going strong just before he died at 57, so maybe his 10th and 11th Symphonies would have tipped the scales in his favor.

Bill James distinguishes between baseball players' "peak" and "career" accomplishments -- e.g., Sandy Koufax vs. Warren Spahn. That's a useful distinction to keep in mind.

5/16/08, 12:49 AM

Blogger K artist said...

It is wonderful to have discovered your Blog.

As it happens, in 1972-3 I worked for George Aczel in London as his apprentice working as a colour matcher, filling in the damaged areas (usually long cracks) in the paintings.

Little did I know that Sid, Eric and George were to become so famous. I was a naive 23year old Australian Gal just dying to be part of a restoration studio and had no idea of the intrigue going on around me. I was sent to the Academy of Art to study colour matching and hence worked on some rather spectacular paintings.
Apparently George thought I was good enough to keep on for some time until I was sacked for asking too many questions.

In retrospect I remember moments when I was not allowed to be in the studio when visitors arrived, and was often asked to be confidential about what I saw.

I am considering writing a book in response to reading Erics two missives...The Art Forger's Handbook and Drawn to Trouble.

In Aug 2007 I started art classes in the country town where I live in Australia and have steaked ahead, gaining enough recognition to have dozens of commissions under my belt.

I have just received a flyer called Fab Fakes, inviting artists to copy a master and enter it into a local competition.

It seems my life has gone in one big circle. I will definitely enter this one.

Cheers for now. Gilly (or should that be Gilty)

8/7/09, 5:18 AM

Blogger K artist said...

Steve, It is wonderful to know that others are interested in Eric Hebborn.

As it happens, I worked for George Aczel in London in 1972-3 as one of his young apprentices, colour matching areas of paintings which were damaged. A lot of famous artists were entrusted to me after which I handed them over to Sid.

Little did I know that George, Sid and Eric would become famous for forgery.

In retrospect I clearly remember George asking me to keep confidential anything that went on in the studio. I was a naive Australian Gal who just wanted to work in a restorer's studio and had no idea what was transpiring around me. I was later sacked for asking too many questions.

In 2007 I started art classes and wonder if I shouldn't do some Fab Fakes (as one gallery has invited local artists to do) just to keep my hand in.

I have read Eric's books, Art Forger's Handbook and Drawn to Trouble. Perhaps I should start my own book of my illustrious travels...for I have many stories from London.

Gilly (or should that be Gilty)

8/7/09, 5:44 AM

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