en dit
David Stein (1935 - 1999) was a French-born artist who until 1966 had been frequently sentenced for theft by the French courts before he became an art forger and art dealer with 15 aliases, according justice files.
Stein often copied paintings in the style of the real masters; His clients was mainly attract by his low prices. For example, he studied Marc Chagall, Matisse, Braque, Paul Klee, Miro, Jean Cocteau and Rouault to copy they colors scheme and inspirations.
In 1967 Marc Chagall notified some forgeries hanging in a New York gallery and Stein was arrested. Art dealers refused to cooperate with the prosecution because it would have incriminated them and make their expertise in the art field questionable. Some art collectors refused to give up their paintings as evidence. Stein was convicted of six counts of art forgery and grand larceny. During his prison term, Joseph Stone [1], the judge who arrested him, brought him to his office to paint. He remained a good friend of the Stein family long after Stein completed his jail sentence. In 1989 he discovered that Stein never stopped making forgeries.
After Stein had served his prison term in the United States, he was deported to France where he served another term. Prison authorities allowed him to make further paintings, although now using his own name. In 1969 a London gallery sold some of these paintings.
After Stein was released, he returned to painting, this time selling his paintings under his own name to put a mask on his real activities.
The book "Three Picassos Before Breakfast" ( Mémoirs of an Art Forger's wife by Anne Marie Stein as told to Georges Carpozi, Jr (Hawthorn Book Inc) was written by David's first wife Anne-Marie about their experiences in the art world. In the mid 80's director Gil Cates gave his agent Arthur Axelman at William Morris a copy of the book which had been written without Stein's involvement. Axelman set out to find Stein and after several years he located him in Manhattan. Stein became an Axelman client and friend. While deals at HBO and ABC did not lead to production of a film, Axelman introduced Stein to Keith Carradine and Alan Rudolph, director of the movie "The Moderns"[2] [3][4]with ultimately starred John Lone, Géraldine Chaplin, Keith Carradine and Linda Fiorentino. The film was set in the Paris of the '20's although filmed in Montreal. Stein appeared in the film as an art critic and provided all of the art. A minor concern was a scene where painting in the style of Matisse and Modigliani was to be burned on camera and a Modigliani destroyed by knife. No one care to destroy any of Stein's copies, "Just good for the camera" say Stein. but a William Morris assistant for agent Axelman suggested making large format Xerox copies of the works to be destroyed. Stein refused and never did the xerox copies and during the scene actor John Lone destroyed the Paintings.[5]
Another book call "3 picasso avant le petit déjeuner" has been written by David Stein and Hervé Prudon and published in 1990 by Editions Robert Laffont[6] in Paris France.
Stein was living in France since sis troubles with the US INS who had told him to leave the US territory in 1988. He met the fFench photo-reporter Stéphane Korb[7] in 1981 in New York and they became close friends [8]. During 10 years, with an aggreement of David Stein, he was witness and confidant for his activities and has the most important photo archives and files about personal life and activities of Stein since 1981.
David Stein tried to escape number of creditors after making in New York and in Paris a large series of collages of Superman signed "Andy Warholl 1960". According to the New York Time in 1989 two comics experts discovered a series of fake collages in the Andy Warhol retrospective in the MOMA. The same event happen in Paris 3 years later. With the complicity of a film producer, Stein put 4 fake Superman collages in a public auction according to the French weekly magazine VSD [9].
David Stein died in October 1999 in Bordeaux, France from cancer. He had three children with Anne-Marie, whom he never married, and who lives in Los Angeles, CA. She is currently in talks with producers for a movie based on her life with David. Their daughter Cecilia, 43, is an artist and entrepreneur who lives in Malibu, CA. with her husband and four children. Their son Frederic, 42, works for United Airlines and is married with one child in Chicago, IL and son Jason, 40, is a high-school teacher living with his wife in Brea, CA. Stein married after being released from prison and fathered another son, Emmanuel 35, Information Technology Manager, who resides in New York City.
Retrieved from "[
en.wikipedia.org];
