Forgery analysis involves examining a disputed document or artwork to determine its authenticity. The process includes thorough examination, comparison with verified materials, and consideration of context. Experts provide detailed reports with a margin of error.
In a forgery analysis, an expert will examine a disputed document or artwork to determine if it is genuine and provide as much information as possible to support a decision as to the authenticity of the item in question. Court cases may involve forgery analysis to support or deny claims made in court, and this process is also used by art galleries and auction houses to check things before offering them for sale. The services of an expert can be quite expensive, especially when the area of expertise is highly arcane.
The first step in a forgery analysis is a thorough examination of the object under investigation. The reviewer may request that no information be provided so that an objective decision can be made based on what can be seen, and in other cases, the person may request information about the circumstances under which the object was found. The process can include things like chemical analysis of paints, inks, papers, and so on, as well as physical inspection and evaluation with imaging techniques like X-rays.
The analyst will also need materials for comparison. In the case of a disputed document, verified documents of known provenance can be used as a basis for comparison. For art counterfeiting issues, other works by the same artist, as well as works by different artists from the same period to compare the materials used, can be valuable to have. Comparison material can be useful for categorically declaring something a fake in some cases, such as when the handwriting on two documents clearly matches.
Counterfeit analysis also includes consideration of the context of the object under discussion. A document purporting to be from the 1820s produced with a ballpoint pen, for example, will naturally arouse suspicion. Likewise, if a document was allegedly produced by someone with limited education and has impeccable spelling and grammar, along with complex sentence structure. People can look for cultural and historical markers to see if something is valid; a painting depicting something someone could not have seen at some point in history, for example, could be declared a forgery or the expert could determine that it was altered at some point in its history.
After a careful analysis of the fakes, the expert draws up a detailed report, summarizing the results and their implications. It’s common to see a thoughtful, rather than categorical response; for example, someone will say that a document “most likely” appears genuine, rather than simply stating that it appears genuine. This is designed to allow for a margin of error in case of future discoveries that might shed different light on where the object came from.
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