the art forger

I heard about The Art Forger through Quail Ridge Books, the independent bookstore in Raleigh, N.C., where I used to live. I still get the store’s weekly emails, which have great book recommendations from the owner and its staff, as well as from other independent booksellers. I go back and spend too much money whenever I’m in Raleigh (which is sadly not too much these days, since my aunt and uncle moved away).

The book was published by Algonquin, a local company whose books Quail Ridge often highlights. The review caught my eye because the story, while fictional, is based around the Gardner heist.

In 1990, two men dressed as police officers bound and gagged security guards at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston and made off with 13 works of art that are now worth more than $500 million. More than 20 years later, none has been recovered, and the investigation had pretty much hit a dead end. In the last six months, however, the FBI has announced that it knows the thieves’ identities and has renewed its publicity about the case in an attempt to get leads on the artwork.

I visited the Gardner during my first trip to Boston with my mom more than 10 years ago, and I was absolutely captivated by it. The eponymous owner was an art collector in the late 19th and early 20th century, and she built the museum, meant to emulate a 15th-century Venetian palace, in order to house her collection. Her will stipulated that the art was to remain as she had arranged it (which was not at all as a professional curator would today); after the theft, the rule was interpreted to stand, so empty frames hang in their places as a constant reminder of the crime.

the concert by Johannes vermeer, one of the works of art stolen from the gardner museum

The poignancy of the loss, combined with the eccentricity of the space and its founder, made me a little obsessed with the museum, and after my visit I read three or four books about the heist. Naturally I had to read this one, too.

It took me less than 24 hours (of course, it was Shabbat, so I didn’t have my usual phone/computer/Netflix distractions): It’s quite the page-turner — if a little hard-boiled and at times downright cheesy.

Because of a mistake in her past involving a former lover and fellow artist, Claire Roth is persona non grata in the Boston art world when she is approached by a local gallery owner to forge a painting — a Degas, and one of the masterpieces stolen from the Gardner Museum. Eager for her reputation’s rehabilitation, Claire reluctantly agrees in exchange for her own show at the gallery and the promise that the original painting will be returned to the museum where it belongs (the forgery will be sold as the original to an unscrupulous collector). In the process, though, she begins to suspect that the original Degas may itself be a forgery . . . and so the fun begins.

Part of the fun for me was that the story takes place in Boston, so I actually knew where most of the (fictionalized) action takes place. Plus, Claire volunteers teaching art at a juvenile facility — so my favorite topic of criminal justice policy gets a little shout-out — but this is less character development than plot device.

But even non-Bostonians and those who aren’t fascinated by the heist or by crime/criminal justice will likely enjoy this quick read. Check it out from your local public library!