Photo/Illutration A painting in the collection of the Museum of Art, Kochi believed to be a forgery (Provided by the Museum of Art, Kochi)

It’s an art museum’s worst nightmare.

In this case, two art museums in Japan have admitted they were fooled by an international art forger. 

On Feb. 7, the Museum of Art, Kochi released the results of a study into an oil painting previously presumed to be by the German artist Heinrich Campendonk which said, “there is an extremely high possibility it is a forgery.”

The work is now believed to have been forged by Wolfgang Beltracchi, a German national who has admitted to forging hundreds of artworks and spent time in prison for his art deceptions.

Campendonk, a representative artist of the German expressionism school, had been thought to have created the painting of a young girl and a white horse in 1919.

The Museum of Art, Kochi purchased the work in 1996 for 18 million yen ($119,000) from an art dealer in Nagoya.

According to the Kochi prefectural government, an investigation was begun in June 2024 after it was tipped off that the work could be a forgery.

The investigation concluded that the work contains pigments that did not exist at the time the real painting was created.

A label pasted on the back of the canvas indicated it was once owned by a genuine German art dealer. But museum officials learned from German police that the label was also a probable forgery.

Museum officials also concluded a similar label was used by Beltracchi in other works he forged.

A formal decision will be made in March about the authenticity of the painting, but museum director Atsuo Yasuda said, “Even if the painting was created by a forger with malevolent motives, if we consider that many experts were fooled and many museum visitors were impressed by the work, it is ironic, but I feel once again that it was a well made painting.”

In the meantime, the Tokushima Modern Art Museum, which is also on the main island of Shikoku, has a painting in its collection that also appears to be a forgery by Beltracchi.

The work depicting a cyclist was thought to have been by the French artist Jean Metzinger (1883-1956). It was purchased in 1999 from an Osaka Prefecture art dealer for 67.2 million yen.

Tokushima prefectural government officials said the work features characteristics of cubism, a movement begun around 1911 by Spanish painter Pablo Picasso and came with a certificate of authenticity.

But in June 2024, experts concluded it contained many similarities to one that was posted to the internet and said to have been created by Beltracchi.

The Tokushima prefectural government is considering an investigation of its own, but a museum official said it would likely be a very difficult one.

Other museums in Japan may also have been fooled by Beltraccchi.

In an interview with The Asahi Shimbun last November, Beltraccchi admitted that the works in the Kochi and Tokushima museums were his forgeries after being shown photos of the two works.

He said he created the forgeries when he lived in Paris in the 1980s and that many were sold to Japan through art dealers in Paris and London.

(This article was written by Kazunori Haga, Tomoya Aie and Toru Tamakawa.)

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