The Fake Vermeer

Tim Harford describes a very interesting incident in How to Make the World Add Up. It’s about an art expert named Abraham Bredius. The man’s speciality was Vermeer. He was a proven expert who had spotted many frauds of Rembrandt and Vermeer paintings over a career spanning decades. And yet he got fooled by a fraud Vermeer painting titled Christ at Emmaus.

 

Harford’s digs into how an expert could have been fooled by a painting like Emmaus. Sure, anyone can be fooled, make an odd mistake. But this painting didn’t even look anything great, not remotely comparable to any of Vermeer’s masterpieces. So how could someone Bredius fall for it?

 

The short answer: it fed into Bredius’ history; what he wanted to believe.

 

Now for the longer version. Bredius had a fascination for Vermeer’s religious works. Only two existed. The first one had been identified by Bredius himself. The second one he’d declared to not be a Vermeer. Other experts had disagreed, and the consensus had declared it a true Vermeer (Bredius too agreed: he had made a mistake). That mistake had stung Bredius. Never again, he’d decided…

 

Then there was the pet theory Bredius had on Vermeer: he believed that a young Vermeer, during his travels to Italy, had been influenced by the Italian master, Caravaggio. Even though:

“This was conjecture; not much was known about Vermeer’s life. Nobody knew if he had ever seen a Caravaggio.” 

Then again, everyone has their pet theories.

 

The forger knew all this:

“He painted Emmaus as a trap. It was a big, beautiful canvas, on a biblical theme, and – just as Bredius had argued all along – the composition was a homage to Caravaggio.”

The forger had taken the usual steps to “age” the painting, and added a few touches in parts of the painting that added to the impression it was a Vermeer.

 

And that was why Bredius made the blunder. The forgery was made keeping in mind Bredius’ history, his desire to not miss the next religious Vermeer. It was not just any forgery; it was a forgery made to fool exactly one particular expert. Which is why Bredius certified it a Vermeer even though he himself had commented upon looking at it first:

“Quite different from all his other paintings.”

And so, instead of that initial feeling working like a warning, it just reminded Bredius of his earlier mistake. Never again. And the perceived “link back to Caravaggio himself” confirmed his pet theory.

 

The forger had set the trap perfectly, writes Harford:

“Wishful thinking did the rest.”