After the Beltracchi fakes, the Giacometti fakes, or the Knoedler affair which plagued the modern art market, ancient art turned out to be caught in the turmoil. Is it the fault of the scarcity of masterpieces? Faced with this crucial lack, the temptation to sell fakes is great. Also, in recent months, cases have followed one another, involving alleged fake 18th century furniture and fake master paintings, splashing merchants, experts, and museum institutions in the process. This environment, which cultivates discretion and stifles out-of-court scandals, with the help of confidentiality clauses, has been abused since March 2015, when a vast investigation for fraud in an organized gang and aggravated money laundering was launched.

Colonel Ludovic Ehrhart, head of the OCBC (Central Office for the Fight against Trafficking in Cultural Property), has let nothing happen since his appointment in August 2014. He intends to eradicate the feeling of impunity that could encourage certain practices. The antique dealer Jean Lupu was the first to be worried. Since June 2015, he is suspected of having had fake furniture made from old wood stamped with period stamps. Placed in police custody for forty-eight hours last April, he is being prosecuted for allegedly tampered with furniture.

Expertise in question

On June 7, 2016, two other market figures were arrested by the OCBC, which suspected them of having sold fake seats: the antique dealer Laurent Kraemer, released under judicial supervision, and Bill Pallot, an employee of the Galerie Aaron, released on October 10 after four months in pre-trial detention. The investigators would have gone back to them following a report from Tracfin, at the end of 2014, about a dubious financial movement concerning several of the protagonists of the case. Along the way, the investigators made contact in September 2015 with Charles Hooreman, a former student of Bill Pallot and specialist in antique seats, who alerted Versailles, in September 2012, to the dubious origin of furniture acquired by the castle. "But the institution did not take this into account, even after a confrontation between his Madame Élisabeth shepherdess, supposedly fake, and the authentic one from the Louvre", specifies the specialist. "We knew Bill Pallot better than Charles Hooreman, whom we had never heard of," said Gérard Mabille, chief curator at the château until 2014.

For the moment, the list of furniture is based on rumors and the investigation is still in its infancy: two folding chairs by François I Foliot purchased from Aaron (2012), a chair by Jacob acquired from Sotheby's (2011 ), two Delanois chairs sold by the Kraemer Gallery, a Madame Élisabeth armchair by Boulard purchased from Thierry de Maigret (2011), and a few others, all purchased between 2008 and 2012 for 2.7 million euros.

On June 10, a dramatic turn of events: Bill Pallot ended up admitting to having had two copies of the Versailles chair made, "for love of the game", from a set from the Belvedere pavilion, commissioned by the Queen around 1780 from François II Foliot. Classified as a national treasure by the Palace of Versailles, which ultimately did not acquire them, they were sold for 2 million euros to a foreign collector by the Kraemer Gallery, which has since reimbursed its client.

But how is it possible that the venerable institution of Versailles saw nothing but fire? What are museum acquisition commissions based on? "The fact that these pieces are sold by major merchants whose notoriety has been established for decades is sufficient as a guarantee for them. They are scholars, not technicians," analyzes Charles Hooreman. "Commissions are not intended to judge the authenticity of works which is, in principle, a prerequisite for the presentation of acquisition projects. Their role is to check whether the price is correct in relation to the market and whether, in relation to public collections, the purchase is appropriate and the heritage interest of the property relevant", emphasizes Claire Chastanier, assistant to the deputy director of collections at the service of the museums of France.

Aware of the problem, the Ministry of Culture indicated, as of June 11, "to launch without delay" an administrative inspection relating to the process of acquisition of the cited properties.

It was then that in September, it was no longer seats but a chest of drawers attributed to Oppenordt which was put on the spot. Classified as a national treasure in 2009, the Louvre considered buying it but changed its mind because the price was too high (9.5 million euros). However, it is at this price that this summer, it was offered to a collector by the expert Roland de l'Espée, as revealed by Vincent Noce in Le Journal des Arts. However, a dendrochronology analysis (dating of the woods) would have shown that the oaks used would have been cut down between 1966 and 1982…

seen in Le Journal des Arts - Marie Potard