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It is almost always newsworthy when a valuable work of art is found in a thrift store or hidden in the back of an attic. Museum curators revel in finding previously undiscovered or unrecognized masterpieces in their capacious collections. But what happens when the opposite scenario takes place – when a masterwork is determined not to be authentic and therefore not of value?
Redwood City resident Stephanie A. Brown, who holds a doctorate in French history from Stanford University, has written a fascinating book entitled “The Case of the Disappearing Gauguin: A Study of Authenticity and the Art Market,” about this very subject. The book reads like a detective story with a famous artist, shadowy characters, international settings and, at its core, a beautiful still life painting that may, or may not, have been created by post-impressionist Paul Gaugin.
The saga began in 2016 when Brown, who has worked as a curator and professor of museum studies at various institutions, was contracted by the Haggin Museum in Stockton, California to assess their art collection. Little did she know that this consulting position would consume her for the next four years and take her across the country and even to France in order to undertake research in libraries and archives.
“I met retired curators whose books I had used in my research. I went into paintings storage in Brest’s Fine Art Museum. I became friendly with the archivists I met. I had not imagined, when sitting in my desk during the pandemic, that this project would lead to that,” she said.
In order to understand the importance of Brown’s work a little background is needed, both on the painting in question and the museum in which it has been housed for the last 94 years. The Haggin, which is located in Stockton’s Victory Park, was founded almost a century ago to celebrate the city’s prominence as an agricultural center of the San Joaquin Valley. Collections include farming equipment, Native American baskets and a one-room school house. But there is also a fine art component that consists of notable paintings by American landscape artists Albert Bierstadt and Thomas Moran as well as European paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Marie Laurencin.
Why would a regional history museum own works of fine art? The museum owes its very existence to the largesse of Eila Haggin McKee and her husband, Robert. When the city was failing in its efforts to raise funds for the museum, McKee stepped forward and offered to underwrite it, with the proviso that the museum be named after his late wife’s family and that they accept her art collection. And so, the Haggin Museum not only owned historical artifacts but also prized art works, the most valuable of which was a small, undated painting entitled “Flowers and Fruit” by Paul Gauguin.
The painting held pride of place in the museum’s galleries, especially as the value of Gauguin’s art work rose into the millions of dollars. It received little fanfare or notice otherwise until the day Brown entered the museum and saw it.
“I was so surprised to come across a Gauguin in Stockton — the Haggin’s art collection is almost all academic, mainstream and traditional art and Paul Gauguin did not fit into that category,” she explained.
Brown began to piece together the history, or provenance, of the painting with some financial backing from the museum as well as during her own travels. In the book, she details how the painting appeared in an auction house in Paris in 1923 and then changed hands numerous times before traveling across the Atlantic in 1929 to appear in an exhibition at the Reinhart Gallery in New York City. This is where McKee, the daughter of a wealthy California landowner and miner, acquired the painting and brought it back to her collection in Stockton, where it remained until her death.
Brown’s meticulous and detailed research into the history of the painting might lead one to wonder why there would be any question about the authenticity of “Flowers and Fruit.” But Brown’s book very effectively explains why, in the vast and murky world of the art market, it is just not that simple.
In order for an art work to be deemed the real thing, acceptance by recognized experts who create a catalogue raisonné, a detailed listing of an artist’s work that includes data like title, date, exhibition and auction history, must be undertaken. In 1964, the first catalogue raisonné for Gauguin, produced by Georges Wildenstein and Raymond Cogniat, listed the painting as having “disappeared.”
Brown said, “In the decades that Wildenstein and team were working on that catalog, Stockton was completely on the other side of the world. In the 1950s both French and American culture was more parochial than now, and people in Stockton didn’t know what was happening in the art world, any more than the art world knew that there was a history and art museum in Stockton.”
It did not help that the Gauguin painting at the Haggin was never really publicized and it never left the museum to be loaned to other, larger institutions. This meant that curators and art historians never had a chance to establish one other important aspect of validity for a work of art: connoisseurship. “So, if there had been an art curator at the Haggin in the 1950s who knew someone at MOMA, say, and the still life had been exhibited there, that would have been an opportunity for the art world to examine it, to see if it made sense in the context of Gauguin’s other works,” said Brown.
Added to the complexity of the situation is the almost Byzantine life of the artist himself. Gauguin is perhaps best known for his tumultuous relationship with fellow artist Vincent van Gogh, thanks to recent books and movies. Brown’s careful research into his life as a self-taught painter, a voyager to tropical locales and a pioneer in the symbolic use of color hones in on Gauguin’s peripatetic lifestyle as a key component. “For Gauguin, who died on the far side of the world from his family in Denmark and his friends and colleagues in France, and who was a nomad most of his professional life, it’s much more difficult to be sure of what’s what, what’s real and what isn’t,” she said.
The artist was often destitute and left canvases with landlords as collateral or traded them for needed goods. Unlike van Gogh, there was no one person who collected, organized and cared for his voluminous output, leaving Gauguin’s work vulnerable to forgery.
A more recent catalogue raisonné does not include “Flowers and Fruit,” but that does not mean the story is over. Brown’s book has led to an exhibition at the Haggin that invites viewers to examine the painting, read its history (which now includes technical analysis of the paint and canvas) and decide for themselves.
On view at the Haggin through the spring is “The Case of the Disappearing Gauguin,” an exhibition drawn from Brown’s book that also borrows its title. The show tells of the painting’s journey and delves into what technical analysis of the paint and canvas reveals.
Brown said that the Haggin can play the long game, since the painting is held in perpetuity by the museum and, while it is currently labeled as “artist uncertain,” tastes and opinions change over time. She joked that, “Unless we find a photograph of Gauguin standing in front of this painting holding a sign that says, ‘Here’s my painting’ we will never have a definitive answer.” But after years of research and examination, what does she think about “Flowers and Fruit”?
“I think different things on different days. What is more interesting to me is how much we all care about the idea of authenticity. The painting is authentic; it has traveled, it has had a whole life, it’s connected to the people in Paris, New York and Stockton. Regardless of whether it is or isn’t a Gauguin, it’s a historical object that can tell us things about our common cultural past. And it’s a pretty painting.”
The Haggin Museum is located at 1201 N. Pershing Ave., Stockton. “The Case of the Disappearing Gauguin” is on view until April 6. hagginmuseum.org
“The Case of the Disappearing Gauguin: A Study of Authenticity and the Art Market” is available at rowman.com and at Amazon.com.
