In a cross-country operation that has taken place in Germany, Switzerland, and Liechtenstein, Bavarian police have allegedly recovered millions of euros of counterfeit art purporting to depict Picasso, Rembrandt, and Kahlo.
The investigators in Bavaria reported that the prime suspect is a 77-year-old German man, who, together with 10 suspected accomplices, is facing conspiracy and fraud charges
The first time the investigators got suspicious was when the septuagenarian head of the ring tried to sell two allegedly original pieces of Picasso paintings in the art market.
Then he offered to sell De Staalmeesters, a popular oil painting of Dutch old master Rembrandt, at 120 million Swiss francs (£113m) – although the original was in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.
The Bavarian State Criminal Police Office (BLKA) stated that the forged De Staalmeesters – also known as ‘Masters of the Clothmakers Guild’ – belonged to an 84-year-old Swiss woman. The Amberg public prosecutor’s office, the BLKA, and Swiss authorities have since started investigating her as the forged piece was seized in Switzerland.
It was later, and on being inspected by an expert in Art, that the police declared: It was, as was supposed, a copy, and not a lost masterpiece by Rembrandt van Rijn.
The painting was captured following a planned action of simultaneous raids in Germany, Switzerland, and Liechtenstein on Wednesday, 15 October.
“We have found a large quantity of suspected art forgeries in the searches and confiscated them, including, the BLKA”, said, “documents, records, mobile phones, storage media, and cloud data.”
According to Bavarian police, the primary suspect tried to sell an additional 19 forgeries, purportedly by world-renowned artists, between 400,000 (349,000) pounds and 14 million (12.2m) pounds.
They also included the works by Mexican artist Frida Kahlo and Flemish old master Peter Paul Rubens, Italian sculptor Amedeo Modigliani, and the Spanish artist Joan Miró.
He had the help of a 74-year-old German man who produced expert reports to verify the authenticity of the artworks in particular cases, only to attest the authenticity of the work of art.
According to the BLKA, before being released on some conditional release, he and the prime suspect were taken into custody on the day of the raids.
According to the police, the investigation is underway.
“All paintings that have been seized will be analyzed in detail by specialists and appraisers, among others, in the next few weeks”, police said.
