A visitor looks at painting by French painter Etienne Terrus at the museum dedicated to the artist, in Elne(Elna). Photograph: AFP/Getty Images
PARIS — One painting included a castle tower that had been built in the late 1950s. But the artist who supposedly painted it, Étienne Terrus, died in 1922.
On another canvas, a light touch with a glove was enough to wipe away what had appeared to be Terrus’s signature, revealing another painter’s name.
These are the most flagrant examples of the disconcerting discovery made by a small art museum in the South of France: More than half of the works in its collection were fakes... Read More