Thank you to Ephrat Livni and The New York Times for bringing this to light with depth and clarity.

We still have more work ahead, but the foundation is taking shape, and we look forward to completing this build soon. Fraud will always exist. But we can build better structures to ensure an artist’s truth is harder to overwrite — and easier to defend.

This is why the work we’re building at the Art Legacy Institute matters. Over the past year, we’ve worked closely with AWS, Alitheon, and the Getty Research Institute to build systems that let artists document their work authoritatively, clearly, and in their own voice.

And the harm isn’t limited to long-dead artists. Living artists are also vulnerable. In recent years I observed escalating fraud targeting living creators unauthorized reproductions, copycat works, and false attributions that undermine their markets and their ability to earn a living right now.

Forgers almost never help clean up the damage they create. Many don’t feel responsible for the chaos they leave behind. Even among the few who later want to set the record straight, most simply can’t. They created works in secret, sold them in shadows, and left no trail.

“Misrepresenting the authorship of works… is a bit like unleashing a virus on art history, collections and markets.” Forgery doesn’t just trick a buyer. It corrupts the historical record. It distorts provenance. It replaces an artist’s voice with someone else’s hand.

The work was exposed as a Wolfgang Beltracchi forgery, one of several troubling discoveries now emerging across Japanese museums. Art forensic expert James Martin put the impact in stark terms:

Love that Oriole.

Huge credit to the Gers gendarmerie, Toulouse investigators, OCBC, and the GIGN for their expert coordination and flawless recovery of every stolen work. A textbook operation in protecting cultural heritage. 👏🇫🇷🖼️ #ArtCrime

The thieves had trouble offloading the paintings, likely due to their high-profile nature. The Buffet Clown alone is instantly recognizable and culturally prized—making it nearly unsellable in legitimate (or even black market) circles.

After a 6-month investigation, French authorities tracked the stolen works to Marseille. On July 1, elite GIGN officers arrested 6 suspects in their 20s during a sting involving an undercover sting. All artworks were recovered—intact.

Stay tuned — I’ll be sharing more stories from the frontlines of art crime investigations, including the risks, the stakes, and the fascinating world of undercover operations. 🕵️‍♂️🖼️

Behind every headline, there’s a team working tirelessly to protect cultural heritage — and stop criminals from profiting off fakes. Congrats to the FBI Art Crime Team.