Elmyr de Hory was a famed Hungarian-born painter and art forger. It is claimed he was responsible for producing over a thousand forgeries that were sold to reputable art galleries all over the world. His activities garnered celebrity from a Clifford Irving book, Fake (1969), and a documentary essay film by Orson Welles, F for Fake (1974).
de Hory, c. 1970
Ursula Andress and Vicenç Caraltó at the Elmyr de Ibiza art gallery, 1971
Art forgery is the creation and sale of works of art which are falsely credited to other, usually more famous artists. Art forgery can be extremely lucrative, but modern dating and analysis techniques have made the identification of forged artwork much simpler.
A City on a Rock, long attributed to Goya, is now thought to have been painted by 19th-century artist Eugenio Lucas Velázquez. Elements of the painting appear to have been copied from autographed works by Goya, and the painting is therefore classified as a pastiche. Compare to Goya's May tree.
Sign at the Taxila Museum, Pakistan, 1981
Forged self-portrait of Albrecht Dürer
Strand von Ste. Adresse, 1863, by Johan Barthold Jongkind.