Forgery examination

1. Art Forgery
Intro and Lab

3. Claude Monet’s Water Lilies
(1840-1926)
Impressionists
 Short loose brush strokes
 Different colors allowing eyes to mix the colors

5. Vincent Van Gogh’s Sunflowers
(1853 – 1890)
Post Impressionists
 Loose brush strokes
 Texture
 Intense Color

7. Jackson Pollock’s Paint Drippings
(1912-1956)
Abstract Expressionist
 Sweeping brush strokes
 Dripped paints
 Non objectives
 Interwoven color wildly on canvas

8. Electromagnetic Radiation
Rays of ultraviolet light, with a wavelength of about
350nm, will reveal touch ups of new paint which
fluoresces in deep blue violet tones compared to the
old surface which shines a light purple where the
varnish remains and no retouching has occurred.

9. Microscopic Examination
 Can reveal an art forgery
 Machine woven canvas has been available only
since about 1850. Since then, machine woven,
canvases commercially primed have been used by
artists.
 Not always exact. Forgers find ways around this.

10. Chemical Analysis
 Historical evidence that dates the use of certain paint
pigments is available.
 Midieval times – Carbon, gold, Silver, tin, mercury,
and sulfur were sometimes used as pigments in their
pure state.
 Middle Ages – Iron oxides, copper carbonates were
used in color
 Modern Age – lead compounds have been banned
from all paint materials

11. The Lab

12. Assume That….
1. All three artists used paints containing lead ions.
(These paints have been banned in recent years)
2. All three artists used unmixed or layered paints
rather than highly mixed colors.
3. Modern paints fluoresce under ultraviolet light

13. Three Methods
 Look at three pieces of artwork
 Ultraviolet Light Test
 Chemical Analysis
 Microscopic Examination