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May 28, 2009

Keeping it all in the Vermeer-ly

(sorry, couldn’t resist pun)

Just spotted (via James Wallis) this New York Times article - one of a series of seven about how people allow themselves to be fooled. This part cites the case of the infamous second world war forger Han Van Meegeren, who managed to fool Nazis, the art world and all sorts of other people with his clever forgeries of Vermeer works in the early part of last century.

The article references two books from last year about the forger and his story: Edward Dolnick’s The Forger’s Spell and Jonathan Lopez’s The Man Who Made Vermeers.

While I’m sure these are both excellent works, it would be remiss of me not to point out that an earlier biography also exists and is well worth a read (as reviewed in the Observer here) - I was Vermeer: the forger who swindled the Nazis by my good friend (and former colleague) Mr Frank Wynne.

Get it from:
Amazon UK (paperback)
Amazon UK (hardback)
Amazon US
Bloomsbury

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One Response

  1. Greig says:
    June 1, 2009 at 8:01 am

    Don’t know why I like forgers so much, but it always seems like a stylish and satisfying (and probably equally frustrating) sort of crime, even if the style is someone else’s.
    Was the article heading a little forgery joke from the Observer folks?

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By the way, I'm female. It doesn't have much impact on what I write about, or how I write, but I thought I'd point it out because so many people who link to this site seem to assume I'm male.

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This is a personal site, created and curated continuously since early 2000 by Meg Pickard, a creative geek, passionate photographer, anthropologist and web experience /community /social media specialist, who works for The Guardian & lives in London, UK.
 
The site includes a blog - a personal and evolving collection of links, opinions, thoughts, ideas, anecdotes and musings - as well as a variety of other projects. It is also a place to aggregate some of the author's distributed web activity, like photos, links and music.
 
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Important note #1

This is a personal site. The contents and opinions contained within don't necessarily reflect those of my employer, family, or cat. They think for themselves (though mostly about tuna, in at least one case), and so do I.

Important note #2

Since the overwhelming majority of content on this site is historical, it should be regarded in light of the context in which it was originally published, and not as indicative or revealing of current perspectives, preferences or experience.

Important note #3

While I work and spend a lot of time thinking and talking about social media, participatory technologies and community development strategies, the vast majority of content on this site is not about that.

This personal site isn't about anything, except the perpetual unfolding of one person's experience, and the perspectives, observations and opinions that involves and inspires.

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