Art history students can learn more from forgeries than from originals. That is why there is now a collection of counterfeit works of art at the University of Heidelberg that the State Criminal Police Office in Berlin has made available. To teach – not to imitate.
Fakes as learning material
In a high-security wing at the University of Heidelberg there are special art treasures that are not allowed to leave this room under any circumstances. Together with her supervisor Professor Henry Keazor, art historian Tina Öcal has built up the “Heidelberg Forgery Study Collection”.
The fakes serve as learning material. In the senior seminar of the Institute for European Art History at the University of Heidelberg, Professor Henry Keazor presents the students with a small-format oil painting.
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Professor Keazor from the Heidelberg Department of Art History analyzes the forgery of a Schad.
SWR
Eberhard Reuss
The picture should show Aschaffenburg. Christian Schad lived there after his Berlin studio was bombed out. In the 1920s Schad was one of the most important representatives of the “New Objectivity”. The painting “Woman in Aschaffenburg” is similar to earlier works by Schad and the simply stretched canvas also fits.
The Berlin State Criminal Police Office is the lender
Only the painting is nowhere proven. The picture is a clever invention. Forgery. “Woman in Aschaffenburg”. The seminar participants are delighted that the study of art history can be so exciting as a detective.
The Berlin State Criminal Police Office is the lender of the forged works of art. In the person of the First Chief Inspector René Allonge. Among other things, he put art forger Beltracchi behind bars.
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