Eric Hebborn
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Eric Hebborn (20 March 1934 – 11 January 1996) was an English painter, draughtsman,
art forger Art forgery is the creating and selling 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 art ...
and later an author.


Early life

Eric Hebborn was born in
South Kensington South Kensington, nicknamed Little Paris, is a district just west of Central London in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. Historically it settled on part of the scattered Middlesex village of Brompton. Its name was supplanted with ...
, London in 1934. His mother was born in
Brighton Brighton () is a seaside resort and one of the two main areas of the City of Brighton and Hove in the county of East Sussex, England. It is located south of London. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze A ...
and his father in
Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
. According to his autobiography, his mother beat him constantly as a child. At the age of eight, he states that he set fire to his school and was sent to Longmoor reformatory in Harold Wood, although his sister Rosemary disputes this. Teachers encouraged his painting talent and he became connected to the Maldon Art Club, where he first exhibited at the age of 15. Hebborn attended Chelmsford Art School and Walthamstow Art School before attending the
Royal Academy The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its pur ...
. He flourished at the academy, winning the Hacker Portrait prize and the Silver Award, and the British Prix de Rome in Engraving, a two-year scholarship to the
British School at Rome The British School at Rome (BSR) is an interdisciplinary research centre supporting the arts, humanities and architecture. History The British School at Rome (BSR) was established in 1901 and granted a UK Royal Charter in 1912. Its mission is " ...
in 1959.''Death of a Forger''
by
Denis Dutton Denis Laurence Dutton (9 February 1944 – 28 December 2010) was an American philosopher of art, web entrepreneur, and media activist. He was a professor of philosophy at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand. He was also a ...
University of Canterbury
There he became part of the international art scene, establishing acquaintances with many artists and art historians, including Soviet spy Sir
Anthony Blunt Anthony Frederick Blunt (26 September 1907 – 26 March 1983), styled Sir Anthony Blunt KCVO from 1956 to November 1979, was a leading British art historian and Soviet spy. Blunt was professor of art history at the University of London, dire ...
in 1960, who told Hebborn that a couple of his drawings looked like Poussins. This sowed the seeds of his forgery career. Hebborn returned to London, where he was hired by art restorer George Aczel. During his employ he was instructed not only to restore paintings, but to alter and improve them. Aczel graduated him from restoring existing paintings to "restoring" paintings on entirely blank
canvas Canvas is an extremely durable plain-woven fabric used for making sails, tents, marquees, backpacks, shelters, as a support for oil painting and for other items for which sturdiness is required, as well as in such fashion objects as handbags ...
es so that they could be sold for more money. A falling out over Hebborn's knowledge of painting and restoration destroyed the relationship between him and Aczel. Hebborn and his lover Graham David Smith''Celebration: The Autobiography of Graham David Smith'', Graham David Smith, Mainstream, 1996 also frequented a junk and antique shop near
Leicester Square Leicester Square ( ) is a pedestrianised square in the West End of London, England. It was laid out in 1670 as Leicester Fields, which was named after the recently built Leicester House, itself named after Robert Sidney, 2nd Earl of Leicester ...
, where Hebborn befriended one of the owners, Marie Gray. In organizing the prints catalogued in the shop, Hebborn began to learn more about paper, and its history and uses in art. It was on some of these blank old pieces of paper that Hebborn made his first forgeries. His first true forgeries were pencil drawings after Augustus John, based on a drawing of a child by Andrea Schiavone. Smith states that several of these were sold to their landlord Mr Davis, several to
Bond Street Bond Street in the West End of London links Piccadilly in the south to Oxford Street in the north. Since the 18th century the street has housed many prestigious and upmarket fashion retailers. The southern section is Old Bond Street and the l ...
galleries and two or three through
Christie's Christie's is a British auction house founded in 1766 by James Christie (auctioneer), James Christie. Its main premises are on King Street, St James's in London, at Rockefeller Center in New York City and at Alexandra House in Hong Kong. It is ...
sale rooms. Eventually Hebborn decided to settle in Italy with Smith. They founded a private gallery there.


Life as a forger

When contemporary critics did not seem to appreciate his own paintings, Hebborn began to copy the style of old masters such as: Corot, Castiglione,
Mantegna Mantegna is a surname. Notable people with the name include: * Andrea Mantegna ( – 1506), Italian painter * Gia Mantegna (born 1990), American actress * Joe Mantegna (born 1947), American actor See also * Mantegna Tarocchi The Mantegna Tarocc ...
, Van Dyck, Poussin, Ghisi, Tiepolo,
Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens (; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat from the Duchy of Brabant in the Southern Netherlands (modern-day Belgium). He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque traditio ...
,
Jan Breughel Jan, JaN or JAN may refer to: Acronyms * Jackson, Mississippi (Amtrak station), US, Amtrak station code JAN * Jackson-Evers International Airport, Mississippi, US, IATA code * Jabhat al-Nusra (JaN), a Syrian militant group * Japanese Article Numb ...
and
Piranesi Giovanni Battista (or Giambattista) Piranesi (; also known as simply Piranesi; 4 October 1720 – 9 November 1778) was an Italian Classical archaeologist, architect, and artist, famous for his etchings of Rome and of fictitious and atmospheric ...
. Art historians such as Sir
John Pope Hennessy Sir John Pope Hennessy (; 8 August 1834 – 7 October 1891), was an Irish and British politician and colonial administrator who served as the eighth Governor of Hong Kong and the fifteenth Governor of Mauritius. Early life John Pope Henness ...
declared his paintings to be both authentic and stylistically brilliant and his paintings were sold for tens of thousands of pounds through art auction houses, including
Christie's Christie's is a British auction house founded in 1766 by James Christie (auctioneer), James Christie. Its main premises are on King Street, St James's in London, at Rockefeller Center in New York City and at Alexandra House in Hong Kong. It is ...
and
Sotheby's Sotheby's () is a British-founded American multinational corporation with headquarters in New York City. It is one of the world's largest brokers of fine and decorative art, jewellery, and collectibles. It has 80 locations in 40 countries, and ...
.''CNN.com'
The prolific forger whose fake 'Old Masters' fooled the art world
24 October 2019
According to Hebborn himself, he had sold thousands of fake paintings, drawings and sculptures. Most of the drawings Hebborn created were his own work, made to resemble the style of historical artists—and not slightly altered or combined copies of older work. In 1978 a
curator A curator (from la, cura, meaning "to take care") is a manager or overseer. When working with cultural organizations, a curator is typically a "collections curator" or an "exhibitions curator", and has multifaceted tasks dependent on the parti ...
at the
National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of char ...
in Washington DC, Konrad Oberhuber, was examining a pair of drawings he had purchased for the museum from
Colnaghi Colnaghi is an art dealership in St James's, central London, England, which is the oldest commercial art gallery in the world, having been established in 1760. Foundation The business that became the Colnaghi gallery was established by Itali ...
, an established and reputable old-master dealer in London: one by Savelli Sperandio and the other by
Francesco del Cossa Francesco del Cossa (c. 1430 – c. 1477) was an Italian Renaissance painter of the School of Ferrara, who after 1470 worked in Bologna. Cossa is best known for his frescoes, especially his collaboration with Cosimo Tura on a cycle of the mont ...
. Oberhuber noticed that two drawings had been executed on the same kind of paper. Oberhuber was taken aback by the similarities of the paper used in the two pieces and decided to alert his colleagues in the art world. Upon finding another fake "Cossa" at the
Morgan Library The Morgan Library & Museum, formerly the Pierpont Morgan Library, is a museum and research library in the Murray Hill neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It is situated at 225 Madison Avenue, between 36th Street to the south and 37th S ...
, this one having passed through the hands of at least three experts, Oberhuber contacted Colnaghi, the source of all three fakes. Colnaghi, in turn, informed the worried curators that all three had been acquired from Hebborn,False Impressions: The Hunt for Big-Time Art Fakes, Thomas Hoving, Simon & Schuster, 1996 although Hebborn was not publicly named. Colnaghi waited a full eighteen months before revealing the deception to the media, and even then never mentioned Hebborn's name, for fear of a
libel Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...
suit. Alice Beckett states that she was told '...no one talks about him...The trouble is he's too good'."Fakes: forgery and the art world", Alice Beckett, RCB, 1995 Thus Hebborn continued to create his forgeries, changing his style slightly to avoid any further unmasking, and manufactured at least 500 more drawings between 1978 and 1988. The profit made from his forgeries is estimated to be more than 30 million dollars.


Confession, criticism and death

In 1984 Hebborn admitted to a number of forgeries – and feeling as though he had done nothing wrong, he used the press generated by his confession to denigrate the art world. In his autobiography ''Drawn to Trouble'' (1991), Hebborn continued his assault on the art world, critics and art dealers. He spoke openly about his ability to deceive supposed art experts who (for the most part) were all too eager to play along with the ruse for the sake of profit. Hebborn also claimed that some of the works that had been proven genuine were actually his fakes. During this period, Hebborn went on record to state that Sir Anthony Blunt and he had never been lovers. On one page he offers a side-by-side comparison of his forgeries of ''Henri Leroy'' by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, and the authentic drawing, challenging "art experts" to tell them apart. On 8 January 1996, shortly after the publication of the Italian edition of his book ''The Art Forger's Handbook'', Eric Hebborn was found lying in a street in Rome, having suffered massive head trauma possibly delivered by a blunt instrument. He died in hospital on 11 January 1996. The provenance of many artworks attributed to Hebborn, including some which are alleged to hang in renowned collections, continues to be debated. Both the J. Paul Getty Museum in
Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
,
California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
and the
Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...
in
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deny that they feature any Hebborn forgeries, although this was disputed by Hebborn himself.


Legacy

A documentary film ''Eric Hebborn: Portrait of a Master Forger'', featuring an extended interview with Hebborn at his home in Italy, was produced for the BBC's ''
Omnibus Omnibus may refer to: Film and television * ''Omnibus'' (film) * Omnibus (broadcast), a compilation of Radio or TV episodes * ''Omnibus'' (UK TV series), an arts-based documentary programme * ''Omnibus'' (U.S. TV series), an educational progr ...
'' strand and broadcast in 1991. The 2014 novel ''In the Shadow of an Old Master'' is based on the mystery surrounding Eric Hebborn's death and its aftermath.Blake, P. J. (2014). ''In the Shadow of an Old Master''. London: Matador. In October 2014 it was announced that 236 drawings were to be sold, in individual lots, ranging in price from £100 to £500 each, by auctioneers Webbs of Wilton in Wiltshire. On 23 October 2014 the drawings went on to sell for over £50,000, with one sanguine drawing, after a design by Michelangelo, selling for £2,200, more than 18 times its expected price; Hebborn's modern drawing manual, ''The Language of Line'', complete with pencil corrections and edits, sold for more than £3,000. Although the identity of the successful purchaser of ''The Language of Line'' remains unknown, and no further copies are thought to have been in existence, Hebborn's former agent
Brian Balfour-Oatts Brian Balfour-Oatts (born 1966) is a British art dealer, collector and writer. He published ''William Scott: A Survey of His Original Prints'', a catalogue of William Scott (artist), William Scott's graphic work. Early life and 1990s Born in E ...
allowed ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'' to have sight of the manuscript, which had been sent to him by a friend of the artist. Details of the previously unpublished text were published by the newspaper in August 2015.


Hebborn's books

* ''Drawn to Trouble,'' Mainstream, 1991 * ''The Art Forger's Handbook,'' Overlook, 1997 (posthumous) * ''Confessions of a Master Forger,'' Cassell, 1997 (posthumous reprint of ''Drawn to Trouble,'' with epilogue by
Brian Balfour-Oatts Brian Balfour-Oatts (born 1966) is a British art dealer, collector and writer. He published ''William Scott: A Survey of His Original Prints'', a catalogue of William Scott (artist), William Scott's graphic work. Early life and 1990s Born in E ...
)


See also

*
Han van Meegeren Henricus Antonius "Han" van Meegeren (; 10 October 1889 – 30 December 1947) was a Dutch painter and portraitist, considered one of the most ingenious art forgers of the 20th century. Van Meegeren became a national hero after World War II when ...
*
Tom Keating Thomas Patrick Keating (1 March 1917 – 12 February 1984) was an English art restorer and famous art forger who claimed to have faked more than 2,000 paintings by over 100 different artists. The total estimated of the profits of his forgeries ...


References


External links


Artfakes
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hebborn, Eric 1934 births 1996 deaths English art forgers English autobiographers English expatriates in Italy English non-fiction writers English people murdered abroad Gay artists LGBT artists from the United Kingdom People from South Kensington People murdered in Lazio Prix de Rome (Britain) winners English male non-fiction writers Conservator-restorers 20th-century English male writers 20th-century LGBT people Unsolved murders in Italy