The Dark Side Of Art - Mondo - Arte.it

World – Behind the charm of art, behind the glitter of international fairs, millionaire sales and large retrospectives in museums, a less well -known and often deliberately ignored face is hidden. It is the dark side of the art world, made from scams, fakes, theft and opaque financial activities. A parallel universe that crosses history and that today, despite more serious laws and advanced digital tools, continues to thrive.

One of the most vulnerable points of the entire artistic system is represented by the market. A market, which is always characterized by poor transparency: the confidentiality of transactions, the anonymity of the buyers, the subjective assessments of the works and the international circulation of objects have been fertile land for illegal activities for decades, often difficult to intercept.

Such unfair practices, in the digital age, unfortunately also find a favorable environment through advanced online scams, which use the lack of preventive checks and the absence of uniform regulations in the sales platforms. It is a phenomenon that likes reality Truffa.net It constantly checks and offers tools for information and prevention to protect users against more and more structured and technological scams.

To report the scope of the phenomenon, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF)An intergovernmental authority born in 1989 on the initiative of the G7 to combat money laundering and the financing of terrorism. In its guidelines dedicated to the art and antiquity market, FATF has identified various risk mechanisms: transactions between unknown topics, manipulable prices, use of offshore companies, dealing with goods via Frank or Franche -Douane areas, such as those of Geneva, Singapore or Hong Kong. Safe, protected places where works of art can be stored for years without being made public by neither the identity of the owner, nor the actual location.

The lack of traceability has also facilitated the recycling of illegal funds over the years, using art as a payment or value reserve. Inflatable or underestimated invoices, international triangulations, fictional donations and works of works between connected companies are just a few of the ways in which the artistic heritage is sometimes used as a discreet alternative to cash.

But the dark side of art does not end here. Thefts of works are a constant in the cultural chronicle. The most famous remains of 1990 atIsabella Stewart Gardner Museum van Boston: Two men disguised when police officers managed to steal thirteen masterpieces, including a worm, three Rembrandt and a Manet, for an estimated value in more than $ 500 million. None of the works has ever been restored. After more than thirty years, the museum still shows the empty frames, as a warning and memory.

More recent and equally emblematic, the theft of sculpture America By Maurizio CattelanA golden toilet with 18 carat, exposed in 2019 to Blenheim PalaceEnglish aristocratic residence. The work was stolen within a few minutes, presumably melted and resold in the weight of gold. In March 2025, after a study that lasted for years, the most important managers were convicted. But there is no trace of the work.

In addition to the thefts, fraud and counterfeit represent a different historical plague of the system. The most striking matter is the one involved in the Gallery in the United States Knoedler & Co.Founded in 1846 and considered one of the most prestigious in the country for decades. Between 1994 and 2009, the Gallery sold a series of false works for around $ 70 million to Mark Rothko” Jackson Pollock And other protagonists of abstract expressionism. The paintings were made by a Chinese falsecar and sold to the gallery through an intermediary, Glaafira Rosales, who was subsequently convicted of fraud and recycling. The scam also included museums, collectors and auction houses, in which the same mechanisms of authentication and expipertise questioned.

These episodes have opened a deep debate about the system of guarantees, checks and responsibilities in the art world. In the United States, theAnti-money laundry From 2020, the anti -money white rules has also expanded to the operators of the artistic market, while the European Union, with the V Anti -Galy White DirectiveIntroduced the obligation to verify the identity of the customer for each transaction of more than 10,000 euros.

However, according to independent analysts and reports from the consultancy companies, regulations often remain inomogenic and difficult to apply. The nature of the art market – fragmented, internationally, with private and intermediaries – makes control activity complicated. Some topics, such as larger auction houses, have implemented compliance systems and in -depth controls. But small galleries, independent dealers or digital sales often stay outside the radar.

OPACITY not only relates to organized crime or great fraud. Even in the daily system of the system, art can become an instrument of avoidance or avoidance. In many systems, artworks are considered movable properties and can circulate with greater freedom than other assets. In some areas of law, the donations of works or their balance improvement can be used to reduce taxable or to protect funds against tax or judicial claims.

Finally, there is no shortage of cases in which artistic collecting is used as a cover for not very transparent financial activities, generation policy or capital movements. And it is precisely this hybrid nature of art – cultural object, investment, status symbol and alternative currency – to thus expose the sector and at the same time to regulate so difficult to regulate.

The question concerns not only legality, but also the general credibility of the system. Because art, if he wants to be considered as a common heritage and no ambiguous goods for a few, needs transparency, clear rules and widespread responsibilities. As the most attentive cultural institutions must be noted, to balance the protection of artistic freedom and control of economic flows. And do it rigorously, without moralisms, but also without giving in to the illusion that the market can regulate itself.

The dark side of art is not a marginal anomaly. It is an integral part of the cultural and financial history of this world. It is not confronted that the system becomes criminalization, but the more solid, more right and perhaps, perhaps, even more worthy of the beauty that it claims to represent more worthy.

For more information:

Fatf – htts

Time – https://time.com/4236970/a-fake-rothko-and-the- enmodern fraud/

The New Yorker – https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/fakery

The Guardian – https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2023/mar/18/america-maurizio-cattelan-gold-toilet-

Reuters – https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/two-jailed-stelen-olid-gold-teilet-blenheim-palace-2025-03-18/

BBC News – https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-68507373

Artnet – https://news.artnet.com/art-world/knoedler-gallery-scandal-2021-recap-1945251

Deloitte – https://www2.deloitte.com/lu/en/pages/artfinance/articles/artfinance-report.html

White and Case – https://www.whitecase.com/insight-alert/money-laonder-art-market

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum – https://www.gardnermuseum.org/about/theft

The Kunstkrant – https://www.theartnewpaper.com/2024/04/10/how-anti-money-laonding-lawsare-changing-the-art-market