A father and daughter from Lawrence, New Jersey, pleaded responsible final month to operating a five-year scheme to promote greater than 200 counterfeit works they claimed have been by among the most well-known Fashionable and modern artists, defrauding patrons of no less than $2m. Erwin Bankowski and his daughter, Karolina Bankowska, who’re going through really useful phrases of 33 to 41 months, respectively, entered their pleas on 28 April at a federal court docket in Brooklyn.
Among the many counterfeit artwork are items meant to be bought as works by Andy Warhol, Pablo Picasso, Banksy, Raimond Staprans, and Native American artists together with Fritz Scholder and Richard Mayhew. Between 2020 and 2025, the counterfeits have been consigned to respected galleries and public sale homes throughout the US, the place they bought for costs starting from $2,000 for a faux Banksy protest print to $160,000 for a counterfeit panorama attributed to Mayhew. The defendants claimed items had handed via personal collections related to the unique artists or had been held by galleries and companies that had since closed. In some instances, additionally they affixed solid gallery stamps and certificates of authenticity to aged paper.
“For years, these defendants painted themselves as purveyors of advantageous artwork whereas promoting lies on canvas to unsuspecting collectors,” Joseph Nocella Jr, a US lawyer for the Jap District of New York, mentioned in an announcement. The duo’s “convictions strip away the varnish and reveal the fraud beneath”.
Among the many prices is a hardly ever invoked depend beneath the Indian Arts and Crafts Act, which prohibits falsely advertising and marketing items as having been made by Native American artists. The prosecutors are looking for restitution of no less than $1.9m. Jeffrey Chabrowe, a lawyer for Erwin Bankowski, instructed The New York Occasions his consumer accepted duty and had ”made a horrible resolution to assist his household”. Todd Spodek, a lawyer representing Bankowska, mentioned she had likewise taken duty for her crimes.
