A fake in a museum, it happens.
Twenty-five fakes is already less common.
A collection of works by American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988) on display since February in the galleries of the Orlando Museum of Art (OMA), Florida, is in the spotlight.
Ferociously sketched self-portraits and other scenes of urban life mix there, in the recognizable style of Andy Warhol's protege, who died tragically at the age of 27.
But the authenticity of this little-known set feeds the suspicion of the art world.
And now also from the FBI.
To discover
Discover the “Best of the Goncourt Prize” collection
Read alsoA Japanese billionaire sells a Basquiat in New York for 85 million dollars
The FBI's Fine Art Department has opened an investigation into Basquiat's paintings on display in the OMA's
Heroes & Monsters exhibit, The
New York Times
learned last week
.
Several experts have already been questioned, including the director of the museum, Aaron De Groft, appointed head of the institution at the beginning of last year.
According to the documents consulted by the
New York Times
, the FBI would have started to take an interest in the group of twenty-five paintings by Basquiat as early as last summer, demanding to be given the documentation of the museum and its council. administration concerning the works in question.
Untitled, Yellow and Black Buildings,
one of the paintings on cardboard attributed to Jean-Michel Basquiat from the enigmatic Thad Mumford collection.
The producer, who died in 2018, would have acquired twenty-five paintings in 1982, directly from the artist.
Orlando Museum of Art
A fuzzy origin
All of these twenty-five Basquiats come from the collection of American producer and screenwriter Thad Mumford (1951-2018).
Acquired for 5,000 dollars in 1982, the paintings, notably made on cardboard, would have been kept for more than thirty years in a rented storage space in Los Angeles, between a few sports relics and memories of an entire television career.
The Mumford collection was sold confidentially in 2012 to two collectors for the small sum of $15,000.
A godsend, the whole being today valued at nearly 100 million dollars.
The collection still has to be authentic.
Because a worrying detail, the art dealer Larry Gagosian, who then hosted and closely supported Jean-Michel Basquiat in the ground-floor of his Californian gallery, did not
has no memory of this set.
The distinguished art dealer does not hide his astonishment at the sudden appearance of such a "lost" collection.
Read alsoKurt Cobain's favorite guitar, that of
Smells Like Teen Spirit,
sold for $4.5 million
Since then, new details have emerged.
The two collectors who acquired all of the Basquiats from Thad Mumford - the art dealer William Force and a former financier, Lee Mangin - have criminal records.
The first was arrested in 1973 as he prepared to transport half a ton of cannabis from Jamaica.
And the second had been convicted in 1979 and 1991 for cocaine trafficking, then convicted a third time in 1999 for fraud.
A third partner and owner of the set would be California lawyer Pierce O'Donnell, who had worked with actresses Amber Heard and Angelina Jolie on their respective divorces (from Johnny Depp for one, and Brad Pitt for the other ).
Jean-Michel Basquiat in 1987, at the opening of one of his exhibitions in New York.
Karen Petersen/Everett Collection/Bridgeman Images
The management of the Orlando Museum of Art has for several months been refusing to exhibit fakes.
“These works were inspected by Basquiat’s most respected specialists before they arrived amidst our collections,”
declared in February Aaron De Groft.
The set would have been authenticated in 2019 by the curator Diego Cortez.
Died in 2021, the expert was a recognized specialist in the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat and was part of the authentication committee of the Basquiat Estate, which manages the intellectual property of the artist.
Other expertise complete this attribution, including that of art historian Jordana Moore Saggese.
A professor at the University of Maryland, the researcher nevertheless declared that nine paintings in the lot could not be attributed to Jean-Michel Basquiat.
A black point of his expertise omitted from the OMA press releases.
Read alsoMolière, an “embassy tool”
Annoying details
The direction of the museum could not explain a very astonishing detail which hardly serves the partisans of the authenticity of the Mumford collection.
On the back of one of Basquiat's paintings on cardboard, a Fedex marking presents a typeface which would not have been adopted by the transport company until 1994. That is twelve years after the supposed creation of the work and six years after the death of the artist.
According to the
New York Times
, part of the curators of the Orlando museum feel a certain uneasiness in the face of this affair.
Also according to the American daily, the management of the institution would also have threatened part of the staff with dismissal in the event of exchanges with the press.
Read alsoA print of
Violon d'Ingres
by Man Ray becomes the most expensive photograph ever sold
For the museum, several elements can speak for the attribution of the works to Basquiat.
The signature of the paintings would have been authenticated.
Finally, a printed poem, written by Thad Mumford, is said to have been inspired by his encounter with Basquiat.
"The poem is almost like a certificate all by itself: it references the works, it references the inscriptions therein and it also references the moment",
assures the director of the Orlando museum who included the object in his exposure.
Problem: the producer's entourage did not know him to have any interest in contemporary art.
And the printed poem denotes in the written production of Thad Mumford which was almost exclusively… handwritten.
“An analysis of signatures and poems is not enough to authenticate a work
,” commented researcher Colette Loll, founder of an art object authentication agency and trainer of several FBI investigators, on Twitter.
Obviously, the American federal agency shares the doubts of the expert.
As for Thad Mumford's Basquiat collection, it should fly to Italy after the conclusion of the Florida exhibition in June.
