inspired by Constable
Artnet
While at Goldsmiths’, Keating did weekend jobs for art restorers, including Hahn Brothers in Mayfair. Utilising the skills he learned in these jobs, he began to restore paintings for a living. He exhibited his own paintings, but failed to break into the art market. And after 2 years, he left Goldsmiths' College ungraduated.
His forgery career started in art restorer Fred Roberts’ workshop, a man apparently not over-burdened by ethics. Amongst the many canvases passing through Roberts' shop was a winter scene by Frank Moss Bennett, an early C20th British artist whose works were widely reproduced cheaply. When Keating criticised a Bennett work, Roberts challenged him to “create a Bennett painting” himself. When he created his own Bennett-like piece, he was so proud of it that he signed it with his own name. Roberts saw it, unilaterally changed the signature to FM Bennett and consigned it to a West End gallery.
Only twice did Keating say he was seduced by the spirit of a dead artist. In 1962, Edgar Degas “instructed” him to fake the Frenchman’s self-portrait. Later in life Keating found that Francisco de Goya “ordered” him to create a self-portrait, by firmly guiding the young man’s hand. That Goya and Degas had chosen him did not surprise Keating; past masters must have recognised themselves in him!
Keating created 20 fake watercolours based on Samuel Palmer works. Keating and Kelly chose the best 3 forgeries and Kelly took them to gallery specialists for auction. Keating viewed the gallery system to be dominated by American avant-garde fashion, with nasty critics and dealers often conspiring to line their own pockets at the expense of both naïve collectors and of impoverished artists. So Keating retaliated by creating forgeries to fool the experts, hoping to destabilise the art world. He acknowledged that he planted time-bombs in his art, leaving clues of the paintings' true nature for fellow art restorers or conservators to find. He deliberately added flaws, or used C20th materials.
Sunflowers by Tom Keating
He enlisted as a boiler-stoker in WW2. The benefit of his military service was eligibility for a 2-year rehabilitation art course, enabling Keating to enter Goldsmiths' College, University of London. But in the programme, he discovered the cultural chasm separating him from his upper-class peers. And although he achieved high marks for painterly technique, his originality was called poor. It was humiliating.
While at Goldsmiths’, Keating did weekend jobs for art restorers, including Hahn Brothers in Mayfair. Utilising the skills he learned in these jobs, he began to restore paintings for a living. He exhibited his own paintings, but failed to break into the art market. And after 2 years, he left Goldsmiths' College ungraduated.
His forgery career started in art restorer Fred Roberts’ workshop, a man apparently not over-burdened by ethics. Amongst the many canvases passing through Roberts' shop was a winter scene by Frank Moss Bennett, an early C20th British artist whose works were widely reproduced cheaply. When Keating criticised a Bennett work, Roberts challenged him to “create a Bennett painting” himself. When he created his own Bennett-like piece, he was so proud of it that he signed it with his own name. Roberts saw it, unilaterally changed the signature to FM Bennett and consigned it to a West End gallery.
Only twice did Keating say he was seduced by the spirit of a dead artist. In 1962, Edgar Degas “instructed” him to fake the Frenchman’s self-portrait. Later in life Keating found that Francisco de Goya “ordered” him to create a self-portrait, by firmly guiding the young man’s hand. That Goya and Degas had chosen him did not surprise Keating; past masters must have recognised themselves in him!
Keating, French Countryside
inspired by Monet's Poppy Fields
the editorial magazine
In 1963, he started his own art school. This is where middle-aged Keating met 16 year old Jane Kelly, a student! Kelly really enjoyed Keating's teaching and asked her parents to pay for fulltime art classes. They became close friends, then lovers and then business partners. Four years later, the two started an art restoration business in Cornwall together.
Keating created 20 fake watercolours based on Samuel Palmer works. Keating and Kelly chose the best 3 forgeries and Kelly took them to gallery specialists for auction. Keating viewed the gallery system to be dominated by American avant-garde fashion, with nasty critics and dealers often conspiring to line their own pockets at the expense of both naïve collectors and of impoverished artists. So Keating retaliated by creating forgeries to fool the experts, hoping to destabilise the art world. He acknowledged that he planted time-bombs in his art, leaving clues of the paintings' true nature for fellow art restorers or conservators to find. He deliberately added flaws, or used C20th materials.
inspired by Sunflowers (1850) by Vincent van Gogh.
Photo from London's National Gallery.
The art market became Keating’s focus, giving him a rationale for adopting other painters' styles and earning money in their name. Keating's preferred approach in oils was a Venetian technique inspired by Titian's practice. His paintings took time to complete, but they had a richness of colour, special optical effects and a variety of texture that Rembrandt would have loved.
In 1970 auctioneers noticed that there were 13 Samuel Palmer watercolours for sale, all depicting the village of Shoreham in Kent. The Times of London arts journalist, Geraldine Norman, looked into the 13 Palmers, sending them to be scientifically tested by a specialist. They were fakes. But it was not until Jane Kelly's brother met Norman that she heard about Keating’s story. Then she met Keating who explained his life as a restorer and artist.
Keating estimated that 2,000+ of his forgeries were in circulation. He had created them as a working-class socialist protest against art traders who got rich at the artists’ expense. But note that he refused to list his forgeries. Keating connected even more deeply with her Geraldine’s husband Frank Norman, a petty-thief-turned-playwright. The two old rogues started swapping stories. Within a few hours, Frank had agreed to ghost Tom's autobiography.
Thus Keating published his autobiography, The Fake's Progress, with Geraldine and Frank Norman in 1977. In it he wrote it seemed disgraceful to him how many artists died in poverty, having been exploited by unscrupulous dealers. The time had come for the art establishment to learn that this old socialist was avenging his brothers in art; his goal was to make the Old Masters widely available and affordable, even for working families.
The art market became Keating’s focus, giving him a rationale for adopting other painters' styles and earning money in their name. Keating's preferred approach in oils was a Venetian technique inspired by Titian's practice. His paintings took time to complete, but they had a richness of colour, special optical effects and a variety of texture that Rembrandt would have loved.
In 1970 auctioneers noticed that there were 13 Samuel Palmer watercolours for sale, all depicting the village of Shoreham in Kent. The Times of London arts journalist, Geraldine Norman, looked into the 13 Palmers, sending them to be scientifically tested by a specialist. They were fakes. But it was not until Jane Kelly's brother met Norman that she heard about Keating’s story. Then she met Keating who explained his life as a restorer and artist.
Keating estimated that 2,000+ of his forgeries were in circulation. He had created them as a working-class socialist protest against art traders who got rich at the artists’ expense. But note that he refused to list his forgeries. Keating connected even more deeply with her Geraldine’s husband Frank Norman, a petty-thief-turned-playwright. The two old rogues started swapping stories. Within a few hours, Frank had agreed to ghost Tom's autobiography.
Thus Keating published his autobiography, The Fake's Progress, with Geraldine and Frank Norman in 1977. In it he wrote it seemed disgraceful to him how many artists died in poverty, having been exploited by unscrupulous dealers. The time had come for the art establishment to learn that this old socialist was avenging his brothers in art; his goal was to make the Old Masters widely available and affordable, even for working families.
Keating & Jane Kelly were finally arrested in 1977, accused of conspiracy to defraud and obtaining payments through deception amounting to £22,000. Kelly pleaded guilty, promising to testify against Keating. But Keating pleaded innocent, on the basis that he'd never intended to defraud; rather he was simply working under the Old Masters' guidance. The charges were eventually dropped due to his poor health after he was very injured in a motorcycle accident, worsened by heart disease. Since Kelly had already pleaded guilty, she had to serve her time in prison. However Keating served no time, and his health soon impro
Starting in 1982, tv episodes of Tom Keating on Painters showed the working methods of Rembrandt and the Old Masters. In each very popular programme, the ageing Londoner demonstrated how to paint eg Turner's ships or van Gogh's sunflowers.
Keating died in 1984, and was buried in Dedham churchyard. After his death, many art collectors and celebrities began to collect his work which became increasingly valuable. Even Keating’s known forgeries, described in catalogues as after-Gainsborough or after-Cézanne, now attain high prices.
Starting in 1982, tv episodes of Tom Keating on Painters showed the working methods of Rembrandt and the Old Masters. In each very popular programme, the ageing Londoner demonstrated how to paint eg Turner's ships or van Gogh's sunflowers.
Keating died in 1984, and was buried in Dedham churchyard. After his death, many art collectors and celebrities began to collect his work which became increasingly valuable. Even Keating’s known forgeries, described in catalogues as after-Gainsborough or after-Cézanne, now attain high prices.
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29 comments:
I assume that because art buyers could not tell if a painting was by Monet, van Gogh or any other famous artist Vs by the non famous Keating, Keating must have been a very talented artist in his own right.
I saw a programme about him - it was most interesting. He was talented.
I quite like this Robin Hood of the art world. I'm always impressed by the talents of art world assessors. It seems that they can usually out a fake, but the work has to be brought to their attention. (I defer to your wisdom on this, Hels)
I loved the sentence "a man apparently not over-burdened by ethics". I am going to file that away, to use one day when conducting forensic auditing.
I'm trying to ease my way back into the blogging world - hopefully I'll be back to writing soon
What an amazing tale that is. He must have been excellent to copy the artists so well, Hel. Interesting to read about him for sure.
Hello Hels, I am having a hard time buying Keating as some kind of populist hero. By faking expensive artists, he devalued the work of all artists, and complicated the lives of all dealers and collectors, the honest ones as well as the ones he professed to dislike. Expert fakers are often touted as brilliant artists in their own right, but this is questionable. A lot of people can make accurate copies of old paintings. In fact, many famous artists got their start this way, and in every museum you can see people with easels set up copying paintings in order to learn technique. It's just that these ordinary copyists don't bother with real or faked old canvas and frames, or sell their work as originals. Most of the celebrity fakers who become collectible are not known for works in their own style, and the appreciation for their "art" seems to stem from the publicity resulting from their exposure.
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Keating as an art teacher, showing different artists' techniques, is another story, and I just looked him up and it seems that at least some of his painting programs are on Youtube so I am going to check them out. I am sure these will be educational and entertaining.
--Jim
p.s. By the way, I have the book The Fake's Progress in Cleveland, but I am not sure if I read it or not. I like reading about forgers, but often the stories are similar, especially the noble sentiments expressed after they are caught.
I remember Keating and whether to prosecute or not. I don't think he was a populist hero but he thumbed his nose at 'the establishment' and made the job of the assessors of art more difficult.
I have heard of Tom Keating his his fakes before don't remember when or how but as I read this I thought yeah this rings a bell.
This is such an incredible story about his art faking journey
He had an interesting point of view.
Student
I have no doubt that Keating was VERY talented in his own right. If I held an original Rembrandt in my hand for 25 years, I still wouldn't have the skill to copy Rembrandt closely. Keating had the skill to make his own copies very believable.
jabblog
Tom Keating openly said his fakes were his response to the corruption and vested interests he saw in art dealers and galleries, profiting whilst impoverished artists suffered and starved. I found that fascinating, even if he was a crafty crim.
Mandy, welcome back :)
I actually agreed with many of Keating's values eg the art dealers and traders often did enrich themselves at the expense of impoverished artists. Or that working class families would never see Old Master type-works because wealthy families and galleries locked them away. But that is no excuse for not writing his own name, date and location on the canvas, rather than conning the honest buying public.
Some of Keating's works earned him several million dollars, before his trickery was discovered in the 1970s. But how did these ill gotten gains help him to dismantle the entire corrupt art world?
https://www.pressreader.com/canada/canada-s-history/20210601/282024740131410
Parnassus
I am not sure that expert fakers, who are indeed sometimes touted as brilliant artists in their own right, cannot be given credit for their very real art skills. 99% of artists in the world may well be untalented, whether they were inspired by famous Old Masters, or by their adoring grandmas. But how many of us could look at a Keating in a gallery and not be impressed by his talents. A sneaky con artist? yes. A very ordinary artist? no.
Read The Fake's Progress. It is a very useful insight into Keating's thinking.
thelma
I wish I remembered the case. But I suppose if the assessors couldn't tell back then, ordinary art viewers like us would have no idea whatsoever.
Keating was found out in 1976 when an art dealer became suspicious of 13 forgeries of Samuel Palmer. In a letter to London Times in Aug 1976, he himself wrote: I flooded the market with the 'work' of Palmer and many others, not for gain (I hope I am no materialist), but simply as a protest against merchants who make capital out of those I am proud to call my brother artists, both living and dead.
Keating admitted he left clues in each painting to distinguish them from their models eg used white lead paint (to show up in an X-ray) to write the word 'fake' on the fresh canvas.
If you like a work of art and buy it, surely in theory you have paid for what you wanted, the art. Maybe you paid too much for it, so that should mean you really love it. Perhaps you are foolish with your money. That it may be by a famous artist or a forgery, don't you still like it? I have little sympathy for dealers, some even here being very unscrupulous.
Jo-Anne
read the text and images in https://www.artnet.com/artists/tom-keating/.
Then you will have no trouble in finding other books and galleries. Enjoy!
diane
I also hate it when working class workers and families were exploited, by experts who should have been professional. But I am sure Keating could have found a more moral way of achieving his goals. What happened to the millions of dollars he earned - did he donate the money to art schools that specialised in young, impoverished artists?
Andrew
if I want a Caravaggio and I am prepared to pay $2873074502490294602386, that is fine. But if some sleaze bucket dealer or auctioner KNOWS it was painted by Fred Nurk in Wonthaggi last Sunday morning and is worth $7.40, I will be destroyed. And not just financially
Again the English Class system creates trouble . If he had been treated with respect his trajectory may have been quite different . If I was very wealthy there is no way I would buy art except directly from the artist because it seems to me after watching may episodes of Fake or Fortune that the way that paintings are evaluated as being fake or not is pretty subjective and full of Ego . I too am appalled at the poverty of artists whose painting now sell for fortunes and ae then consigned to vaults in Switzerland . Its disgusting . There is my rant for the day !!!!
mem
Rant away :)
In the art (medicine, science, politics and fashion) world, class wasn't the only issue that counted.
Think of Jewish artists in central Europe whose works were thrown out from public galleries before and during WW2 because of religion.
Think of the heaps of socialist academics who lost their positions in USA because of the FBI Fascist witch-hunt.
And remember the brilliant professionals who couldn't get visas into Australia via the White Australia Policy because of their ethnicity.
I am still disgusted now, decades later.
This story rings slightly familiar to me, but I'm not sure why. THis guy was talented, wasn't he? And seemed to find some success. Too bad he couldn't have found success as his own as an artist earlier in his career.
Erika
It seems that Keating, from a struggling working class family, was treated badly when he was a young artist in training. Despite being noted for his skillful painterly techniques, and excellent experience in art restoration, Keating could never graduate. No wonder he felt revengeful later on.
Margaret
I imagine it would be easy to copy modern art that consists of one red circle and two blue lines. But can you imagine "being inspired by" Tarquin and Lucretia, painted by Titian in 1571.
Keating was certainly more skilled than Banksy! It's easy to see where his socialist principals came form but I find it a bit disingenuous - and the art market hasn't changed. Cynicism rules!
bazza
What happens if you are correct and cynicism remains for a long time? Will ordinary collectors ask for a fully refundable contract if the assessment is dodgy?
I personally would stop collecting paintings and would turn to collecting antique porcelain or silver instead.
I don't know whether to be appalled or inspired by this guy!
Kylie
his motives might have been admirable, but Keating conned trusting buyers for his own selfish profits. I find the entire story very exploitative, and not just by Keating himself.
roentare
Read his autobiography to see that he acknowledged 2000 fakes, but would not say which works were included in that total. He died without a word of sympathy to his victims.
Very true . I think a lot of our human progress has happened in spite of our stupidity really . I discovered the other day that Isaacs Newton almost had to leave school to run the family farm after his step father died . Imagine the near loss of that rediculosity ( if thats a word )
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