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Showing posts with label stuart george. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stuart george. Show all posts

May 15, 2013

Decanter.com's John Stimpfig spotlights "The Wine Forger's Handbook" by wine journalist Stuart George and ARCA Founder Noah Charney

Wine connoisseur John Stimpfig spotlights the The Wine Forger's Handbook by wine journalist Stuart George and ARCA Founder Noah Charney in Decanter.com, the online publication of the international wine magazine:
The slim volume gives a short history of forgery and fraud in the wine world, before going on to detail two short case studies covering two of the best known alleged fine wine fraudsters of recent times: Hardy Rodenstock and Rudy Kurniawan. It also functions as a guide with practical tips and a checklist of actions on how to avoid becoming a victime of counterfeit wine. The book comes at a time when collector awareness and press interest in the subject of fraud has never been higher, after series of high-profile legal cases.
The ebook The Wine Forger's Handbook was published in March and can be ordered at Amazon.com.

Here's a link to a post on the ARCA blog about the FBI's investigation into wine fraud.

March 11, 2012

FBI Arrests Collector in Wine Fraud After Investigation by the FBI Art Crime Team

LOS ANGELES - Museum Security Network disbursed the headline, "FBI Art (?) Crime Team - Wine collector accused of fraud, trying to sell fake French vintages." According to an article on The Los Angeles Times blog by Andrew Blankenstein, a resident of Arcadia, a suburb in the San Gabriel Valley, was arrested March 8 "by FBI agents assigned to the Los Angeles office after a years-long investigation by the FBI Art Crime Team".

The FBI's National Stolen Art File Search categorizes objects from "Altar" to "Wine Cooler" and includes traditional fine art (paintings, watercolors) and other valuables such as musical instruments, guns, prayer mats, and even ice pails.  The FBI's Top Ten Art Crimes range from Iraqi Looted and Stolen Artifacts to Theft from the E. G. Bührle Collection, Zurich.

In the fourth issue of The Journal of Art Crime (Spring 2011), James Charney reviewed The Billionaire's Vinegar (Three Rivers Press, New York, 2009) which discusses the issue of authenticating fine wines.

In the most recent issue of The Journal of Art Crime (Fall 2011), Noah Charney interviews Stuart George, an expert on fine wines, and the crimes committed in the wine world.
Noah Charney: How frequently do you suspect that fraud takes place in the world of high-priced wines? 
Stuart George: Leaving aside the 1787 Lafite mentioned above in "The Billionaire's Vinegar), I have never knowingly seen a “genuine fake” bottle of fine wine. Nonetheless, merchants’ and auctioneers’ outrage at fake wine is like Claude Rains’ shock at learning that there was gambling at Rick’s place in Casablanca. Anything that is valuable is in danger of being faked. 
More attention is being paid to preventing fraudulent wine than ever before, which suggests that as the Hong Kong/China market has gone supernova, the amount of fakes and forgeries being sold has increased significantly.According to some sources, fake wines flow in and out of Hong Kong like the cheap and illegal Irish reprints of books that allegedly flooded the British market in the eighteenth century. I was told that China’s government officially deplores the country’s inexorable production of fakes but in practice turns a blind eye.