Bukowskis

Marinus Koekkoek's "Landscape with Figures and Cattle" fetched $66,000 at Bukowskis in 2003. A year later, Sotheby's offered it as an Ivan Shishkin, with a high estimate of $1.2 million, but withdrew it before the sale.

Sotheby's

As prices for Zinaida Serebriakova's works rise, so do the number of forgeries. Her "Reclining Nude" (1929) made £1.1 million ($2.1 million) at Sotheby's London this past June.

El Lissitzky Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky Natalia Goncharova Marinus Adrianus Koekkoek Piotr Petrovich Konchalovsky Dimitri Krasnopevtsev Aristarkh Lentulov Kasimir Malevich

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Catherine MacDougall, of MacDougall’s auctions in London, echoes Kurnikova’s caution. “To pub­lish a picture and say, ‘Be­ware, this could be a fake!’ is not the way to go about things,” she says. “In the West, you’d be sued.” MacDougall had no qualms about including Tretyakov certifications in the catalogue for her firm’s June sale of Russian paintings.

Does the catalogue nevertheless serve a purpose? Yes, she states, given the “chaotic” situation in Russia involving fakes. Kurnikova demurs somewhat. “It’s a very young market,” she points out, “and gradually becoming more civilized.”

Roschin asserts that this civilizing process has been advanced by his catalogue, which has already prompted collectors to return more than 50 paintings to dealers. “I believe these publications will help clear the air and restore confidence,” the publisher says.

"Russian Roulette" originally appeared in the September 2008 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's September 2008 Table of Contents.