Absolute Legend

[rynling]

How Art Forgery Actually Works
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54O-fxQd-P8&ab_channel=Insider

There is a series of videos on YouTube (here) called "How Crime Works." Some of the videos I've tried to watch are a bit too long and not so interesting, but the one about art forgery is a treasure.

Despite my true and sincere love of crime, I tend to think drug cartels are bad news and also responsible for the sort of government and police corruption that causes serious problems for normal people just trying to get through the day. There is nothing sexy about that. But using your immense god-given talent to fuck over the sort of shitty wealthy people who buy fine art as an investment? That's the good stuff, and I could listen to this guy talk all day. I'm not a big fan of audiobooks, but I'm strongly considering making his book (here) the first one I listen to.

I learned about the "How Crime Works" video series through the Dark Souls podcast episode on Grand Theft Auto V (here), by the way. It's a good episode.

Comments

[renegadefolkhero]

Some of my favorite documentaries are about art and wine forgers. They often talk about how the system is generally complicit because so many players (auction house, appraiser, dealer, etc) benefit from high-valuation of these items.

The depth of skill and knowledge required is really something. When the guy said you couldn't do it easily today, I thought about how Beltracchi got busted for using titanium white.

Anyway this dude was forging in the clink! Good for him. Rock on man.