gems, art, art collecting, museums, aesthetics, conservation, museum science, fakes, forgery, counterfeit, fake art

A special kind of problem faced by all museums is the recognition of fake or fraudulent objects. Museum staffs are primarily concerned with collections of objects and are experts in analyzing and evaluating their significance in one way or another, although the degree to which they must remain alert to fraud naturally varies according to the type of museum and the particular field involved. In the more strictly scientific disciplines such problems are generally minimal, although notorious hoaxes such as the Piltdown Man hoax have served as important reminders that deception can and does occur. At the opposite end of the spectrum, curators in art museums confront the problem of detecting forged objects to an extraordinary extent. Forgers have long been active in producing art objects in every conceivable style and period, and there is scarcely an expert in these fields who is not continually concerned with questions of authenticity.