Wolfgang Beltracchi was born on Wolfgang Fischer on 4 February 1951 and is a German former art forger and visual artist who has admitted to forging hundreds of paintings in an international art scam netting millions of euros.
29 Facts About Wolfgang Beltracchi
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The total estimated profits Wolfgang Beltracchi made from his forgeries surpasses $100m.
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In 2011, after a 40-day trial, Wolfgang Beltracchi was found guilty and sentenced to six years in a German prison.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi was freed on 9 January 2015, having served just over three years in prison.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi is today a successful artist who sells his paintings and sculptures to international collectors without the protection of art makers and the international art market.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi Fischer was born 4 February 1951 in Hoxter, Germany and grew up in Geilenkirchen, Germany.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi was expelled from secondary school when he was 17 and later went to art school in Aachen.
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Max Ernst 8.
Wolfgang Beltracchi designed the artwork to The Fall of a Rebel Angel, the eighth studio album from German musical project Enigma.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi did not copy existing and well known paintings, but painted his own paintings imitating the style of the artists in question.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi made up the titles and motives, or claimed that a painting of his was a lost work that was only known by its title in old documents or catalogs.
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Many of the paintings that Wolfgang Beltracchi sold allegedly came from this collection.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi's labels purported his works came from the 'Flechtheim Collection' and on the verso had a strategically placed adhesive label bearing a picture based on a miniature woodcut in portrait format, the lower half of which had a roughly sketched, depicting the storied gallery's owner in profile.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi had used a paint tube produced in the Netherlands.
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Wolfgang and Helene Beltracchi were arrested on 27 August 2010 in Freiburg.
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On 27 October 2011, Wolfgang Beltracchi was sentenced to six years in jail.
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Wolfgang and Helene Beltracchi were allowed to serve their sentences in an open prison, as long as they had regular jobs.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi agreed to paint only in his own name and to move from Germany to France.
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In January 2014, Helene and Wolfgang Beltracchi published two books: an autobiography and a collection of letters the pair wrote to each other while in prison.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi's forgeries embarrassed many art evaluation firms and numerous customers have sought legal remedy against the art specialists who mistakenly certified the artworks' authenticity.
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The BBC reports that Wolfgang Beltracchi currently makes "millions" from selling his original works.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi employs a distinctive approach he calls "Free Method Painting," which draws parallels to Lee Strasberg's method acting.
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Just as an actor immerses themselves fully into a character, Wolfgang Beltracchi immerses himself into the study of various artistic styles and historical contexts.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi's refusal to adhere to a single, recognizable personal style is a deliberate choice.
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Wolfgang Beltracchi's works are characterized by their technical excellence and the breadth of stylistic diversity, making them stand out in the art world for their variety and execution.
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Terri Pyle, Adjunct Professor in the Philosophy Department at the University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida: Wolfgang Beltracchi and the Authenticity of Forgery:Not a Moral Failure Reiner Schurmann's Broken Hegemonies is a philosophical approach to how humans have historically created a rhetorical framework of ideas to operate in their existence.
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Max Ernst 26.
Wolfgang Beltracchi has claimed he has forged hundreds of paintings by more than 50 different artists.
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The painting is listed as a forgery from the Sammlung Jagers and is one of the five Max Ernst paintings Wolfgang Beltracchi admitted to forging during the 2011 trial.
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The painting is listed as a forgery from the Sammlung Jagers and is one of the fourteen paintings Wolfgang Beltracchi admitted to forging.
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The painting is listed as a forgery from the Sammlung Jagers and is one of the fourteen paintings Wolfgang Beltracchi admitted to forging.