Oliver Gill Individual Issue Study: The Knoedler Gallery scandel

Made You Look: A True Story About Fake Art is a documentary that chronicles the infamous Knoedler Gallery forgery scandal from its inception all the way to its admittedly anti-climactic end. Nestled as one the core interviewees is Ann Freedman herself, the “Knoedler director who peddled the fakes, to address the situation head-on”. Made You Look presents a wide array of perspectives from different parties caught up in the scandal ranging from duped clients, lawyers, editors, and the very people who made the scandal possible. I admittedly knew very little about this case and was enthralled by the complex scandal that occurred. For my individual issue study I will give an in depth overview of the documentary as well as diving deeper into the court case itself.

Ann Freedman in Made You Look

Freedman insists throughout the entirety of the documentary that she “did not knowingly sell fakes”. Even after her trusted colleagues confide that the pieces they purchased from her were fake, she antagonizes them and doubles down that all of the art was real. The con itself began in 1995 when a friend of Freedman, Jaime Andrade, told her he had “a very special friend who wanted to show [her] a Rothko”. In comes Glafira Rosales, an unknown art dealer, with this supposed Rothko. Freedman describes Rosales as “polite, well-dressed. Very soft spoken”. They cut to M.H. Miller, an editor at the New York Times stating “there was no reason to trust Glafira Rosales. Nobody knew who this person was”. Freedman recounts Rosales revealing the Rothko and immediately fell in love with the piece. 

“Untitled”, 1956, exhibited as Rothko

Rosales disclosed very little when it came to how she got the piece and the supposed benefactor was given two distinct backstories, the latter being spun in response to pushback further down the line. Story one follows Mr. X , a well off man who traveled from Europe to Mexico to New York, where he purchased artwork from Alfonso Ossorio, a “patron…of Jackson Pollock”. He created a supposed network with Abstract Expressionist artists and acquired a collection of work that he would then pass onto his son, Mr. X Junior, who would go on to sell the work for cheap. 

Abstract Expressionist sales exploded around the year 2000 and became a prime target for forgery. Freedman explains that in the 50s and 60s AbEx art sold for cheap and that it was believable that a collector could accrue a body of said work. The difficulty with these unidentified pieces is that they lack provenance, simply defined as the “history of ownership”. Several interviewees call out Freedman’s lackluster attempt at tracing back the work’s history while she stated “it was credible to me…there was mystery, but there’s often mystery in provenance and I helped solve that mystery as time went on”. What’s more, “none of the works Rosales brought to the gallery were in the catalogue raisonnés of the artists”. Freedman claims David Amfam, a AbEx scholar who created the catalogue raisonnés for Rothko, saw the piece she received from Rosales and confirmed it was a Rothko. 

Rosales would continue to bring in fraudulent paintings, maneuvering around questions surrounding Mr. X while Knoedler sold one or two fakes a year. They introduce Rosales’ boyfriend, José Carlos Bergantiños Díaz, an accomplice with a history of trafficking forged documents. Red flags were ignored in lieu of the untapped potential of AbEx artwork being rolled in by Rosales. Freedman hired an expert, E.A. Carmean Jr. to research and authenticate the pieces brought by Rosales and placed her full trust in him. She surrounded herself with experts who shared her belief in the work’s authenticity and ran with it.

The documentary then introduces Domenico and Eleanore De Sole: both art collectors while Domenico “serves as the chairman of the board of directors at Sotheby’s”. The De Soles knew little about Knoedler but were urged to speak with Freedman and obliged, leading to them seeing an uncovered Rothko and Pollock piece. The De Soles inquired about the Rothko piece, and in many ways fell into the same trap as Freedman with latching onto the piece while ignoring the blaring red flags. “Untitled, 1956” was sold by Rosales to Knoedler for $950,000. The De Soles bought the piece for $8.3 million, a seemingly steep price that was actually “kind of low for a Rothko”. Domenico insisted on “a warranty of authenticity” for the piece and “Freedman supplied a multi-page document listing every ‘expert’ who had seen the painting, authenticated the painting”. It is important to note that the De Soles clearly look down upon Freedman and speak about her very snarkily. They insist she knowingly duped them and seem exasperated at every turn when it comes to describing Freedman’s actions.

The documentary then introduces the forger behind it all; Pei-Shen Qian, a Chinese immigrant capable of replicating the styles of multiple AbEx artists. Qian “was trained at The Art Student League…a school in Manhattan where greats like Alexander Calder, and Pollock received some of their training”. Qian’s paintings would be handed off to Bergantiños who “put the finishing touches on it to give it the appearance of age and credibility”. Interestingly, Qian was paid very little until he saw one of his paintings displayed in a gallery and demanded Rosales to increase his pay. The documentary goes on to touch upon the trust the general public has in museums and art institutes. Rosales likely would have been brushed off had she attempted to sell the pieces directly to different museums, but with the added benefit of Knoedler’s positive reputation, suspicion of duplicity was swept under the rug for countless years. At the end of it all, “over 60 fake paintings were ultimately sold for $80 million”. 

“Untitled”, 1949, exhibited as Pollock

The first inkling of suspicion for Knoedler occurred when Jack Levy, an art collector, purchased a Pollock for $2 million under the condition that the piece got evaluated and approved by IFAR: The International Foundation of Art Research. IFAR’s executive director Dr. Sharon Flescher explains that “Mr. Levy negotiated that if we didn’t accept it as a Pollock, he could get this money back”. IFAR noted several worrying aspects regarding the piece both materially and stylistically: “there was new paint on old canvas…the masonite had aged completely differently” from another Pollock piece from the same year, “about the way the paint was applied, about that greenish-brown wash”. They also included “16 pages of documents showing why [the] provenance was inconceivable”, reasoning that a piece created during the peak of Pollock’s career was very unlikely to have such little documentation. 

IFAR concluded that they “do not accept it as a work by Pollock…which, in the art community, is generally understood as it is a fake”. Knoedler would go on to hide the report and disregards its claims, touting that the investigation was actually inconclusive. Ironically, Knoedler would go ahead and refund Levy for his $2 million purchase while continuing to posit that the piece was real.

Following this first bout of suspicion, Rosales spun a new provenance for the work; Mr.X was now gay and came to New York where he purchased work from David Herbert, a gay art dealer who was “employed at the Sidney Janis Gallery, who represented a lot of the Abstract Expressionist artists, by the Betty Parsons Gallery, also represented a number of Abstract Expressionist artists”. Mr.X allegedly had a wife and kids back in Switzerland and risked exposing his sexuality should he ever return home with the work. Incredibly, Freedman completely believed Rosales’ new story, doubling down that Rosales never retracted her statements.

The next incident that crumbled Knoedler’s walls involved the Dedalus Foundation and its president Jack Flam. Both Flam and Freedman had signed off on Motherwell Elegy pieces being authenticated by their respective galleries that were originally sold by Rosales. Flam suspected that there was something wrong with both of these pieces both materially and stylistically and confronted Freedman about the Motherwell Elegy she owned. Flam had high hopes that Freedman would be appreciative of his worries but was instead met with a wall of resistance. Flam claims that Freedman said Motherwell and David Herbert were close but upon doing their own research discovered that “he didn’t exist on Motherwell’s radar”. 

“Spanish Elegy”, 1953, exhibited as Motherwell

Flam then requested that both pieces be forensically tested by “Jamie Martin at Orion Analytical”. Freedman claims she never trusted Martin and seemingly disregards his conclusion, much like with the IFAR report. Dedalus Foundation lawyer Perry Amsellem explains “Knoedler and Ann Freedman sat on that report. Didn’t turn it over to us until January of 2009, and when she turned it over, they omitted the last four pages, which were the most important pages”. The report deduced that the paintings were fake, noting a multitude of issues including pigments being used that were not yet invented and underpaintings being sanded down with an electric sander. 

Upon realizing there was a massive fraud at hand, Flam got the FBI involved in an investigation against Knoedler. Freedman describes this sequence of events as an attack and  “attempt to destroy her reputation”. Flam set up a PI to look into Rosales and would quickly uncover Bergantiños’ history with trafficking stolen art. Freedman was asked to step down from Knoedler and would voluntarily resign in 2009.

The first lawsuit against Knoedler was filed in 2011 by art collector Pierre Lagrange. Lagrange had purchased a supposed Pollock piece for $17 million but was unable to resell the piece to Sothebys due to a lack of provenance. Lagrange would go on to get the piece forensically tested and revealed that the yellow paint used was not commercially available until 14 years after Pollock’s death. Knoedler would proceed to immediately close their doors following Lagrange’s lawsuit against the gallery. Freedman would continue to insist the artwork was real throughout the aftermath of Knoedler’s closing.

“Untitled”, 1950, exhibited as Pollock

The first and only confession occurred in 2013 following Rosales’ arrest. Through the FBI investigation it was revealed that Rosales was keeping all of the money made through sales when in actuality 90% of the money should have gone to the family who originally owned the paintings. Furthermore, she did not report the intake of millions of dollars as income, allowing the FBI to “file federal tax charges, and those tax charges gave us great leverage, ‘cause not only did she commit a tax crime, the fact that she’s keeping all of the money, that’s evidence that she knows there’s something wrong with those paintings”. After spending several months in custody, Rosales disclosed Qian’s involvement as the master forger. By then, however, Qian had already fled the country and was able to return to China without any repercussions. 

Elizabeth Williams, “Courtroom illustration: De Sole pointing to the fake Rothko.”

Of the 10 lawsuits filed against Freedman and the Knoedler Gallery, only one actually went to trial - filed by the De Soles in 2012. Freedman’s line of experts took the stand to speak on their authentication of the fraudulent work and practically all backtracked on their original claims. David Amfam even stated under oath that he had never seen the initial Rothko piece in person. Ruth Blankschen, Knoedler’s accountant, was the last person who testified and revealed that “if it hadn’t been for selling these, you know, $80 million worth of fake paintings, Knoedler would have been millions of dollars in debt”.

 In a sudden turn of events, the court case was settled mere hours away from when Hammer and Freedman were supposed to take the stand. The De Soles insist that had they pushed the case Freedman would have easily been found as guilty, but the district attorney noted that it would be difficult to actually prove Freedman knowingly sold fakes beyond a reasonable doubt. In the end, the only person who was criminally charged was Rosales who faced nine months in prison and had to forfeit all her assets. The documentary notes that Rosales’ seemingly light sentence ultimately came down to her being the only honest person who cooperated with the investigation along with highlighting how she never implicated Freedman despite the benefits of doing so. 

The documentary concludes with a playful “search of 2 fugitives”: Bergantiños and Qian. Bergantiños fled to Spain and remains practically untouchable due to being a Spanish national, with Spain refusing to extradite him to the US. Ironically, Bergantiños claims the reason he returned to Spain has nothing to do with the Knoedler case. The documentary then tried to seek out Qian in Shanghai but was only able to speak with his wife. Similarly to Bergantiños, Qian was safe from any sort of consequence due to China’s refusal to extradite him.

Overall I very much enjoyed this documentary. I appreciated the differing perspectives and there were many comedic moments where people would prove one another wrong or have a back and forth of sorts as they told their version of certain events. To me it's hard to say whether or not Freedman knew these pieces were fake. She gives enough of an air of naivety to warrant such gullible behavior but one must wonder if she ever had any doubts. It’s human nature to want to believe in an opportunity of a lifetime, particularly when the opportunity opened the doors to millions of dollars and the status of a revered art dealer. While I do empathize with the De Soles, their attitudes very much come across as snobbish and demeaning. They were once in the same position as Freedman, ignoring the red flags in lieu of a potential gold mine and would go on to weaponize the sense of betrayal they felt on trial despite hardly knowing Freedman. Eleanore recalls crying on the stand and claims this was her authentic reaction to reliving the event. To me this entire case feels like people peddling their own views as authentic and refusing to acknowledge their mistakes or slip ups. The only person who genuinely owned up to their crimes was the one person not being interviewed throughout the documentary - Rosales. Part of me wonders if the only reason she exposed Qian and not Freedman was because she knew he could flee back to China. Alternatively, her not giving Freedman up almost proves that she truly believed these pieces were real.

Victor Juhasz, “Domenico and Eleanore De Sole sit behind Ann Freedman and her defense team.”

I now want to go more in depth with the court case itself. Throughout the three week court case, “the De Soles did little to mask their contempt for Freedman” with Domenico outwardly scoffing during her cross examination and Eleanore’s face stretching “into a sarcastic smile when Knoedler’s lawyers tried to discredit the plaintiffs’ witnesses”. The De Soles “had three main presenting attorneys—Gregory Clarick, Aaron Crowell, and Emily Reisbaum”, Freedman was represented by Luke Nikas, and Knoedler was represented by Charles Schmerler. The De Soles posited that “Ms. Freedman knew that the Rosales works were counterfeit or intentionally overlooked obvious signs of fraud” while Freedman insisted that she truly believed in the pieces’ authenticity, reasoning that “she ended up owning several herself, evidence of her belief in them”. Incredibly a “purported Jackson Pollock—with the signature misspelled (“Pollok”)—hung in her apartment for 15 years”. 

In terms of the letter of authentication the De Soles received before purchasing the Rothko, the list included “Laili Nasr, who was making a supplement to the Rothko catalogue raisonné; Christopher Rothko, the artist’s son; art historians Irving Sandler, Stephen Polcari, and David Anfam, the author of the catalogue raisonné for Rothko’s works on canvas; and E. A. Carmean Jr., a former curator at the National Gallery of Art who had been put on retainer by Knoedler for upward of $50,000 a year, primarily to research the provenance of Rosales’s works”. Excluding Carmean and Polcari, many of those listed testified that they had no knowledge of being on the list. As previously stated, Amfam “testified that he was never asked to give his opinion on the Rothko, and worse, he never saw it in person, only in pictures that Freedman had sent to him after the De Soles purchased it”. In terms of why the De Soles decided to settle “right before Freedman’s testimony”, Reisbaum stated “the defendants saw what was happening, finally, I guess. And we really settled when they were ready to settle”, and Clarick stated “what I particularly like about the timing is not that they did or didn’t testify, but they settled at a point where we really told the whole story”.

                                                  

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     Bibliography

Avrich, Barry, director. Made You Look: A True Story About Fake Art. Melbar Entertainment Group, 2020.

Bowley, Graham, and Colin Moynihan. “Knoedler Gallery Heads to Trial in Sale of a Fake Rothko.” NYTimes. January 24, 2016. Accessed October 23, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/25/arts/design/knoedler-gallery-heads-to-trial-in-sale-of-a-fake-rothko.html.

DeSantis, Alicia, and Josh Keller. “From One Garage in Queens, a World of Fakes.” NYTimes, December 26, 2013. Accessed October 23, 2023. https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/12/26/arts/fakes.html.

Durón, Maximilíano, and Alex Greenberger. “The 10 Best Art Documentaries of 2020.” ARTnews, December 29, 2020. Accessed October 22, 2023. https://www.artnews.com/list/art-news/artists/2020-best-art-documentaries-1234580425/lifeline-clyfford-still/. 

Miller, M. H. “The Big Fake: Behind the Scenes of Knoedler Gallery’s Downfall.” 

ARTnews, November 18, 2019. Accessed October 22, 2023. https://www.artnews.com/art-news/artists/the-big-fake-behind-the-scenes-of-knoedler-gallerys-downfall-6179/. 

Moynihan, Colin. “Knoedler Gallery Director Settles Lawsuit Over Fake Rothko.” The New York Times, February 7, 2016. Accessed October 22, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/08/arts/design/knoedler-gallery-director-settles-lawsuit-over-fake-rothko.html.

Tarsis, Irina. “From the Archives | Knoedler Obituary (1857 – 2011): Select Legal History of the Oldest American Art Gallery - Center for Art Law.” Center for Art Law, July 11, 2019. Accessed October 23, 2023. https://itsartlaw.org/2019/07/11/from-the-archives-knoedler-obituary-1857-2011-select-legal-history-of-the-oldest-american-art-gallery/.