Forgeries and Networks – The “Mittheilungen des Museen-Verbandes” and counterfeiting networks in the twentieth Century (ForNet)

• Applicants: Professor Dr. Henry Keazor; Thorsten Wübbena
• Subject Area: Art History
• Term: since 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 531800604

The project will use digital tools and methods in order to assess the detecting and preventive strategies against art forgeries, as implemented in the journal “Mittheilungen des Museen-Verbandes…”, published between 1899 and 1939 by the “International Association of Museum Officials for the Prevention of Forgeries and Improper Business Practices”. Here, art historians, art dealers and museum employees from the leading museums, collections and sale institutions of their time in Europe and North America published exposed forgeries of ancient to modern art. The aim was to put an early stop to the sale – and: by exposing forgers and forger's workshops – also to the production of such counterfeits through rapid international reconnaissance. The journal can be seen as a kind of forerunner of contemporary attempts at forgery detection and prevention, such as the “Database of Critical Works”, set up in 2005 in Germany. One aim of the project is to examine the efficiency of the endeavor: Did it live up to its goals? Since one of the main traits of the “Verein” and of the “Mittheilungen” was their international network structure, they will be analyzed with the help of a digital network analysis. This is also helpful when it comes to further questions about the changes in the function and organizational structure of the “Verein”, about the path and further fate of the objects, discussed in its journal, as well as about their changing status as originals, forgeries, copies or re-creations. In the process, archival research and digital analysis will mutually motivate and differentiate each other. The project’s digital component has several distinct but interlinking goals. First of all, the relevant information in each of the entries in the “Mittheilungen” will be captured in XML. On the basis of this dataset, networks are created and analyzed. Initially, the network analysis focuses on revealing that web of relationships that tied the main actors, institutions, and objects to each other. However, rather than being static, the network analysis is organically shaped and guided by the art historical research questions that underpin this project. At the same time, particular patterns detected by the network analysis are likely to reveal and suggest new avenues for the archival research undertaken in the project. Apart from serving the research questions of ForNet, the resulting dataset has a broader application as well. ForNet envisages the creation of an online research environment, a dedicated website that provides all the data, including the XML transcriptions and network visualizations, generated by the project. Moreover, the data in the XML transcriptions are ingested in a specifically-designed graph database that powers this website and makes it possible to query the data in a dynamic way. As such, ForNet provides also a resource that serves scholars and members of the wider (academic) community.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants