Each chapter of this book is as gripping as a miniature thriller: Art experts Stefan Koldehoff and Tobias Timm trace the entanglements between art and criminal machinations using selected cases and instructive characters. Forgeries, money laundering, tax fraud, the plundering of antique historical sites – the list of crimes committed in connection with art is long. Yet, with the enormous rise in prices and the globalization of the art market, this criminality has achieved a new quality – artnapping, in which a work of art is taken hostage and only returned for a ransom, is no longer rare today.
Stefan Koldehoff and Tobias Timm write about those who get rich off of art illegaly: from the small-time crook to the extremely rich master forger. And they shed light on the duty-free zones and dark rooms of the global art scene.
From the table of contents: • The betrayed avant-garde • The cult around Nazi memorabilia • The fake Galileo Galilei • Achenbach and the Aldi connection • Kleptocrats: The search for the Marcos collection • The Getty case – An oligarch and his alleged Leonardo da Vinci • and much more
