This Master of Fake Masterpieces Had to Forge for His Life
Goering loved Christ With the Adulteress. It became his pride and joy, and was prominently showcased in his mansion. After the war, the Allies discovered Goering’s art collection – looted from all across Europe – stashed in a mine. Included was Christ With The Adulteress, along with receipts and documentation that linked it to van Meegeren. The sale of such a rare piece of Dutch cultural heritage to Hitler’s number two was collaboration with the Netherlands’ Nazi occupiers. Arrested and faced with charges punishable by death, van Meegeren had to fess up to save his life. He confessed that the “Vermeer” purchased by Goering was a fake that he had forged, along with many other paintings attributed to Dutch Masters. Understandably, the authorities were skeptical. So he offered to produce another forgery. He would literally forge for his life.
In the presence of reporters and court-appointed witnesses, van Meegeren forged another “Vermeer”. He used the same materials and techniques to produce Young Christ in the Temple, which experts acknowledged was produced by the same hand that had created the “masterpiece” bought by Goering. A witness described the then-imprisoned Goering’s discovery that his beloved Christ With The Adulteress had been a fake as that of a stunned innocent, who discovered for the first time that there is evil in the world. After van Meegeren demonstrated that he was merely a criminal and not a traitor, the prosecutors dropped the charges of treason and collaboration against him. He still went to jail for the art forgeries, but the revelation that he had conned the Nazis transformed him from a derided traitor into a national hero.
