WYWH: Knoedler Trial Uncut (Week 1)

By Center for Art Law Team

After the “public closing” (words used by Melissa De Medeiros, a former Knoedler employee in her testimony on January 27) of the venerable Knoedler Gallery (the “Gallery”) in November 2011, rumors spread that the Gallery was implicated in selling forgeries of the top Abstract Expressionist masters - Mark Rothko (1903-1970), Jackson Pollock (1912-1956), Richard Diebenkorn (1922-1993), Clyfford Still (1904-1980), Willem de Kooning (1904-1997) and other important post-War American artists.

As the tale of how the Gallery accepted on consignment and purchased some of the fake artworks, signed and dated as if they were created in the late 1940s - late 1950s unfurled close to a dozen lawsuits alleging fraud and other causes of action were brought against the Gallery, its penultimate director and its owners. The art market and professionals in related fields prepared to witness a public trial and a look into the Knoedler dealings with its clients, advisors and colleagues. In 2012, the Getty Research Institute, which collects for preservation and study archives of art dealers and galleries, among other materials, acquired a pre-1971 portion of the Knoedler archive. The rest of the documents were retained by the parent company. The magical cut off date has nothing to do with the 1970 UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property. Apparently, it was selected due to the fact that it was in 1971 that the Gallery, in existence for more than 100 years, was acquired by the legendary entrepreneur Armand Hammer (his grandson was the owner of the gallery in 2011).

By the end of 2015, less than a handful of the claims and complaints brought against Knoedler et al. were settled for undisclosed sums of money and under confidential terms.However, two cases De Sole v. Knoedler Gallery and Howard v. Freedman, et al., were scheduled for trial in January 2016. The latter case, involving a fake Willem de Kooning, was filed by collector John Howard in 2012 and settled on December 2, 2015.