Elmyr de Hory (1906 - 1976)

River Boating

Elmyr de Hory, artist's proof on heavy deckle-edged paper, signed in pencil lower right, marked lower left in pencil: E. A.

1/5. 21" x 29.5" unframed

Elmyr de Hory (1906-1976) was a Hungarian-born painter and considered to be the greatest art forger of modern times. He received his formal classical art training at the Akademie Heinmann in Munich and at the Academie le Grande Chaumiere, in Paris where he studied under Fernand Leger.

Throughout his 30-year career as a master forger, Elmyr de Hory is believed to have inserted more than 1,000 forgeries into the art market, with many of these works still housed unexposed in museums and private collections today. De Hory was no copyist, however. Each of his images was purely of his own creation, relying on his masterful execution to emulate the technique, the palette, and style of the respective master whose work he was forging.

De Hory's forgeries garnered celebrity from Clifford Irving's international bestselling biography Fake! The Story of Elmyr de Hory, the Greatest Art Forger of Our Time and a documentary film by Orson Wells, F for Fake (1974).

Provenance: Gift from the Artist to current owner, c. 1971

Condition:Extensive foxing event on border but due to the full ink coverage of the art, there is no visible foxing on the art, nor does it appear that the foxing came through the extra heavy paper. In the style of Henri Matisse