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The Art Forger Who Became a National Hero
In July of 1945, Han van Meegeren picked up his badger-hair brush and began to paint his last forgery.
Over a decade, the wiry Dutchman had surreptitiously become Europe’s premier conman — a disgruntled artist-turned-forger who’d sold his works for tens of millions of dollars. Fueled by rejection from the art world, he had duped leading critics, wealthy collectors, and even a high-ranking Nazi official into believing his works were real. What’s more, he had chosen to do so by emulating the works of Jan Vermeer, a technically-immaculate master of the Dutch Golden Age.
But post-World War II, a “Vermeer” painting sold to Nazi Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring was traced back to van Meegeren — a painting of such high quality that experts agreed no one could have possibly fabricated it. Accused of plundering for the Germans, the artist was sentenced to death. In an odd twist, van Meegeren was given one last chance to prove his innocence: If he could produce a brilliant forgery before the eyes of court-appointed witnesses, he’d be spared. What ensued would make the man one of the most popular figures in the Netherlands.
This is the story of Han Van Meegeren, the most dramatic forger of the 20th century.
Han van Meegeren was born on October 10, 1889 in a small Netherlands community just outside of Deventer. From an early age, van Meegeren’s father, a history teacher, strictly discouraged him from any creative pursuits: When the man caught his son drawing or exploring art, he’d force him to write “I know nothing, I am nothing, I am capable of nothing” hundreds of times on a sheet of paper.
As a young student, van Meegeren’s talents were nonetheless recognized, and he received moral support from his educators. One of them, Bartus Korteling, had taken a fascination with the work of Johannes Vermeer (one of the great painters of the Dutch Golden Age); he copiously deconstructed the man’s work for van Meegeran, showing the boy how to “manufacture and mix colors” and emulate the aged style. Korteling also instilled in van Meegeran a belief that the modern Impressionist movement was “degenerate art” and that the masterworks were of unparalleled artistic quality.
Meanwhile, van Meegeren’s father continued to decry the merits of art and placed his son in an architecture program. Unbeknownst to the man, his son pursued art classes at the school instead, all the while keeping up with his architecture coursework. Upon graduating, van Meegeren had a brief tenure designing buildings, but soon went against his father’s wishes and attended art school. Here, he won numerous prestigious awards, and was recognized as one of the premier young artists in the country.