The Forger's Spell - Edward Dolnick [83]
The Last Supper by Van Meegeren, Caldic collection, Rotterdam
Isaac Blessing Jacob by Van Meegeren, Museum Boymans-van Beuningen, Rotterdam
Van Meegeren cranked out one biblical forgery after another, each one worse than the ones before, and each one selling for millions. The figures in Isaac Blessing Jacob look like paper cutouts, and in The Washing of Christ’s Feet something has gone dreadfully wrong with Christ’s right arm. Van Meegeren explained away his carelessness. Why try harder, he asked. “They sold just the same.”
The Washing of Christ’s Feet by Van Meegeren, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
Christ with the Woman Taken in Adultery by Van Meegeren, Rijksdienst Beeldende Kunst, The Hague
Hermann Goering, second only to Hitler in the Nazi pecking order, fancied himself an art connoisseur. He looted artworks from across Europe, literally by the trainload, and he craved a Vermeer. In 1943, his buyer found him this one, Christ with the Woman Taken in Adultery, actually a Van Meegeren forgery. Goering traded 137 pictures from his collection for this lone “masterpiece.”
When the war ended, Goering tried to hide his stolen paintings. The 101st Airborne found his stash of treasure in the Bavarian Alps, including his prize “Vermeer.” Photo of Christ with the Woman Taken in Adultery, National Archives
The Art of Painting by Vermeer, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria
Goering had tried to grab The Art of Painting, one of the most famous and admired Vermeers of all. Hitler, a failed artist intent on assembling the world’s greatest art museum, “purchased” it for himself.
American soldiers found much of Hitler’s stolen art, thousands of paintings in all, hidden in a salt mine. The painting at the right is Willem Drost’s Officer in a Red Beret. (Topham/The Image Works)
The Pianist Theo van der Pas with the “Ghosts” of Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, Brahms, Schumann, Chopin, and Schubert by Van Meegeren, Teekeningen I, 1942
Christ at Emmaus struck its Dutch audiences as almost holy, a sublime and uplifting work of art. Van Meegeren had tried to create the same mood in his own work, as in The Pianist Theo van der Pas with the “Ghosts” of Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, Brahms, Schumann, Chopin, and Schubert. The art historian Albert Blankert notes that when Van Meegeren painted in his own name, critics scoffed at his sentimentality. But when he presented that same “elevated pathos” under the name Vermeer, the world fell at his feet.
Christ at Emmaus by Van Meegeren, Museum Boymans-van Beuningen, Rotterdam
36
THE SUMMER OF 1937
Van Meegeren’s first target was his old dupe Bredius, the Vermeer connoisseur who had swooned over Lady and Gentleman at the Harpsichord five years before. The old man had fallen hard for one forgery. The art world had failed to go along, but perhaps Bredius was worth another try.
Like other forgers, Van Meegeren seldom risked venturing into the open. He needed a middleman, preferably one above suspicion, to do the actual work of selling Emmaus. He found the perfect candidate almost on his front stoop.
Gerard A. Boon was a friend of Van Meegeren’s from The Hague. He was tall, slender, well spoken, and well connected. For fifteen years he had represented the high-minded Liberal Party in the Dutch parliament. He and Van Meegeren had crossed paths because Van Meegeren had been the pet artist of The Hague’s upper crust. When an industrialist or a politician wanted a flattering portrait, they turned to Van Meegeren.
Boon was far more than a charming dinner guest. Few people in Holland had more solid reputations. In 1931, he had received one of the state’s highest honors, the Order of the Dutch Lion. Progressive in his politics, he had argued in favor of women’s rights in the 1920s