What the Forger Told Me

Mert knew he was the best living artist in the city where he'd lived and taught for 27 years.  He made sure his students also became the best that they could be.  He drew prolifically, portraying the buildings, landscapes, and citizens of Chicago.

He was born in 1921, the child of Eastern European immigrants and was a first generation U.S. citizen.  He told me his home life was more than bleak:  His family was riddled with neuroses.  Doing everything he could do to not go home after school, he attended art classes every afternoon in the settlement house in his neighborhood.

Practice, practice, practice.  Mert grew to excel.

Late afternoon one summer day, when his students at the Art Institute were not in town, a knock came at his door.  It was a man he'd never seen before:  well-dressed and carrying a small bag.  He told Mert that he'd heard that Mert was the best artist around and that he needed a painting very similar to one in his bag.  In fact, it turned out, he wanted a forgery of a lesser known work of an Italian artist.  It had been in private hands but the man now had a buyer.  Mert told the man that he would do no such thing.  He did not copy others' work.

The man left and Mert got back to work in his 5th floor walk-up.  He realized the man had left the bag with the small masterpiece behind and Mert realized he didn't even know the man's name.

Months went by.  It was getting colder and the nights were long.  One evening after a simple meal of borscht, Mert pulled out the painting and pondered- could he do it?  Of course, he could!  Hmmm...10 pm and on a whim, Mert challenged himself to the task of forging a famous artist's work.  At 1:30 in the morning, he poked on his last mark to the picture.  To his eyes, anyone who knew anything about the great master would know that this was a mere copy.  And that was that.

Springtime comes slowly in fits and starts to the lakeside city of Chicago.  Late afternoon when he had his window open to the breeze off Lake Michigan, the knock came at his door again.

"Are you finished?"

"Yes, I am."

The man took in the copy and asked what he owed the artist.  The usually decisive Mert saw the numbers 50 and 75 go back and forth in his head.  Before he could answer, the man had plunked down $750- onto the kitchen table and abruptly left with both paintings in the same small bag.

Today, at age 92, Mert knows that painting was turned right around and sold for a great deal more to a museum.  Darned if he knew which one.

That is what the forger told me.

Rowena Dunlap Burke
March 2013