Unnecessary mysteries

Signs that provenance research has gone off the rails include:

• extremely long texts that leave the reader so confused that he/she concludes that there is no such thing as knowledge
• massive use of words indicating uncertainty or unknowability
• omission of crucial information that is available and which provides important context
• mention of names which are known to be either persecuted Jewish collectors, Red Flag dealers of Nazi looted art, or associates with forgers WITHOUT mentioning that that's who they are
• excessive speculation
• false information

In this series of posts, we will examine a few remarkable examples of needlessly confusing provenance texts published by major museums. 

 

Forgery and false provenances

False provenances are needed to insert art forgeries into the historical record.

Where there is forgery there is false provenance.

Dealers who sell forgeries are great sources of false provenances. A special kind of writing is involved in the creation of false provenances. A talent for making things that are not true seem at least plausible. 

Question: Do dealers of forgeries also sell looted art?

Some, like Knoedler, are known to have sold both at one time or another. Knoedler's prestige and power enables it to insert lies into the historical record without being challenged for a very long time. 

What about the others? How to find out?

How to Track the Falsification of Provenance?

*** see new 2023 video from the Knowledge Graph Conference ***

False provenance is a feature of Nazi looted art. How to track multiple versions of provenance texts over time and identify, classify and analyse "errors"? 

We begin by listing some of the most frequently observed "errors".

Types of "errors" observed in provenance texts of Nazi looted art, forced sales and duress sales:

Provenance Error Type	Description
NameOmitted	real owner name omitted
NameAdded	fake owner name inserted
WrongDate	incorrect date
WrongPlace	incorrect place
WrongSeller	incorrect identification of seller
WrongBuyer	incorrection identification of buyer
WrongDealer	incorrect identification of the dealer or intermediary
WrongTransaction	incorrect representation of the nature of the transaction
WrongStory	incorrect represention of the sequence of events
NameMispelled	mispelled name
Other	other

Who authored and published the errors? Who financed the research and publication? When? In what context? These elements can be described in the metadata of the provenance text.

Provenance text metadata suggestions

Provenance Text Metadata	Description
Publisher	Name and URI of the person or organisation that published the provenance text
Type of publication	book, article, catalogue raisonné, website, other
Publication	Title, identifier
Author	Name and identifier of the individual who wrote the provenance (or if this is not available, the insitution)
Payer	Name and identifier of whoever ordered or paid for the writing of the provenance
Date of publication	Date the version was published
Version	a number indication the version of the provenance
URL to Provenance Text	If published online, the url
Archived URL	URL to the provenance version on a specific date (important because online provenance changes)
Archive date	Date of the archived URL
Artwork the provenance describes	Title and identifiers for the artwork described (url, accession number)
Noteworthycircumstances	significant events that may help explain the particularities of the version
Known to contain errors	Y/N (if yes, refer to error type)
Other

A look at sources

Provenances cite source documents. Who wrote the sources cited? Who published them, when - and why? What new information did they introduce? Have any problems of accuracy already been identified in the source document?
One cannot assess the reliability of a provenance text without verifying the reliability of the sources it cites.

Provenance Source Cited Metadata Suggestions

Provenance Source Metadata	Description
Date source cited was published	Original publication date of the source cited
Author of source cited	Author of the source cited.
Publisher of source cited	Name and ID of the publisher of the source cited.
Reliability of source cited	Have any false provenances been found in the source cited?
New information introduced by source cited	Did the source cited introduce a new name, date, place, explanation? Which?
First citation of source cited	Name and ID of the first publication to cite the source cited
Payer of source cited	Name and ID of the person or organization that financed the publication of the source cited
Uncertainty of source cited	Does the footnote refering to the source cited contain a ? or words like probably, likely, possibly indicating uncertainty or speculation?
Contemporaneous?	Y/N
Red Flag on Author or Publisher?	Y/N Is the author, publisher or payer of the source publication on the ALIU Red Flag list of Names from 1946?
Holocaust Claim?	Y/N Does the name of the author, publisher or payer appear in any legal documents connected to a Holocaust art claim?

What has already been done in tracking provenance errors? How can these be coded? Provenance errors, like potato chips, rarely stop at just one.
To be continued....

photo by Evan-Amos / Public domain