Police bust art crime network that fakes Banksy and Picasso

(Source: AP Photo)

Italian police have uncovered a massive pan-European counterfeiting network creating and selling fake artworks attributed to some of the biggest names in modern and contemporary art, including Banksy, Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol.

About 38 people were investigated in Italy, Spain, France and Belgium on suspicion of conspiracy to handle stolen goods, forgery and illegal sale of works of art, the Carabinieri paramilitary art squad and the Pisa prosecutor’s office said in a joint statement.

Pisa’s chief prosecutor, Teresa Angela Camelio, said experts from the Banksy archives who helped with the investigation considered the operation “the greatest act of protection of Banksy’s work.”

Pest Control, the agency representing the artist, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Its website says counterfeiting is common and urges people looking to buy Banksy pieces to beware of “expensive fakes”.

Other allegedly forged artists included giants of 19th and 20th century art such as Claude Monet, Vincent van Gogh, Salvador Dali, Henry Moore, Marc Chagall, Francis Bacon, Paul Klee and Piet Mondrian.

Investigators said they had seized more than 2,100 fake pieces, with a potential market value of about 200 million euros ($327 million), and discovered six counterfeiting workshops, including two in Tuscany, one in Venice and the rest elsewhere in Europe.

They said their investigation began in 2023 when they seized around 200 fake pieces from the collection of a businessman in Pisa, including a copy of a drawing by Italian painter Amedeo Modigliani.

That led them to forgeries being sold by auction houses across Italy, and put them in touch with a well-known group that would specialize in forgeries of Banksy and Warhol.

To boost their credentials, the unnamed suspects organized two Banksy exhibitions with a published catalog at prestigious locations in Mestre near Venice and Cortona in Tuscany, investigators said.