The Science of Art Authentication
Art authenticity is a central concern in THE CRAFTSMAN. How are art forgeries identified, then and now?
Originally produced during Lantern Theater Company’s 2017/18 season and streaming March 2–28, 2021 as part of our new Plays from the Lantern Archives program, The Craftsman is concerned with — among other themes — the importance of art authenticity. A discovery of a new work by a revered master brings acclaim — and fortune — to both its discoverer and its authenticator. But when that work’s authenticity is questioned, bigger questions arise: does a painting’s intrinsic worth change when its artist’s identity does? How much value is in the signature rather than the work itself?
The science of art authentication struggles with these questions in the attempt to determine a work’s true creator. Using state-of-the-art tools and a good deal of detective work, art authentication seeks to find the truth of a work’s provenance — and to protect the investment of interested buyers.
Until recently, however, this practice relied heavily on rudimentary tools and expert knowledge. Some authentication could be performed subjectively: is the style consistent with the supposed artist? Do the brush strokes and colors match? Can the work’s history or provenance be confirmed? Sometimes, though, more rigorous scientific analysis is needed.
At the time of The Craftsman, just a handful of tools were available to would-be authenticators:
- The Touch Test: Oil paint takes years to fully dry. Authenticators might touch a painting to feel whether it’s hard or soft, indicating whether or not it was recently painted.
- The Alcohol Test: Oil paint that’s not fully dry will dissolve with a little bit of alcohol. A tester could apply a dab of alcohol to a corner to see whether the paint held up to the trial; if it did, it was likely older.
- Testing the Craquelure: Oil paintings develop a fine network of cracks over time, called craquelure. The authenticator can examine these cracks closely; fake cracks will often be filled in with pencil, charcoal, or India ink, and will have a smoother texture than authentic cracks.
- The Morelli Method: Named for 19th century Italian art critic Giovanni Morelli, this method examines how a given artist paints very small details: ears, fingernails, and other tiny but repeatable elements. If an authenticator knows intimately how a painter treats these elements, they could determine if a painting was forged by the accuracy of those details.
- X-Ray: X-Ray and x-ray diffraction were available during the time of The Craftsman, though they were expensive and not always called for. X-rays could reveal two things: whether there’s another painting underneath the one being evaluated, and what pigments are used in the work in question. If either the age of the underdrawing or the chemical makeup of the materials are newer than the purported age of the artwork being tested, the work is a forgery.
In the last 50 years, more scientific options have become available to art authenticators. Some of these are updates to the time-honored tests. The craquelure, previously examined by sight, can now be evaluated via Reflectance Transformation Imaging, which creates a topographical map of a painting’s cracks that museums can keep on file for reference. X-rays and other methods of seeing below the visible painting have also become more sophisticated, using infrared reflectology or Raman spectroscopy to determine what’s hiding underneath a painting or within its pigments.
New tests have also been developed in the years since The Craftsman’s events in the mid-1940s. A painting can now be tested with a mass spectrometer to determine how many radioactive isotopes it contains; based on the number of nuclear tests that were performed in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, scientists can determine a painting’s age by the amount of radioactive elements it contains. The rings in the trees used for the frame or wood panels can also be tested via a method called dendrochronology, which helps scientists determine the age and origination of the wood used. And UV light can be employed to examine a painting’s varnish; old paintings will shine under UV light, but newer paintings won’t fluoresce as much, or as unevenly.
With all of these tools at our fingertips, how is it possible that forgery and misidentifications are still common in the art market? Ultimately, that’s because it’s next to impossible to prove that a given artist painted a specific work. All of these tools can date paintings, proving whether or not they’re consistent with the techniques and materials of the piece’s supposed time. What they cannot do, however, is absolutely attribute the works to the artists themselves. As with the recent $450 million sale of the “Salvatore Mundi” — purportedly a lost work by Leonardo da Vinci, but also possibly a copy or the work of another unknown 16th century Italian artist — authenticators can prove the age, but not the creator, of a painting. And the big business of art relies on purchasers willing to take their chances, both now and in the 1945 Amsterdam of The Craftsman.
The Craftsman is part of Plays from the Lantern Archives, a new program celebrating some of the finest productions from recent Lantern seasons, brought vividly back to life on screen. This world premiere performance was professionally filmed with a live theater audience in November 2017, and is streaming March 2–28, 2021. Visit our website for tickets and information.
