Otto Wacker (forger)


Otto Wacker (born August 11, 1898, October 13, 1970) is a German art dealer, Vincent van Gogh's forger.

He came from Düsseldorf and was trading with paintings. In the early 1920s he also performed as a dancer under the pseudonym Olindo Lowael. In January 1927, he presented thirty-three van Gogh canvasses in Berlin, allegedly a few years earlier, from a Russian immigrant living in Switzerland whose identity could not be revealed for safety reasons. Reproductions of paintings from the Wacker collection were included in the van Gogh's catalog published by de la Faille. Their authenticity soon began to raise suspicions and divided the art critics' camp into two opposing camps. As the collector continued to refuse to reveal the exact origin of the images, the prosecutor's office investigated the case in December 1928.

An analysis carried out in the course of the investigation excluded the authenticity of canvases, while investigators at Wacker's brother found another van Gogh's false image. On April 6, 1932, a trial of a forger took place at the Berlin court. In the sentence of April 19, he was sentenced to a year in prison. After the appeal was issued in December of this year, a much more severe sentence - 19 months of imprisonment and 30 thousand marks of fine. Due to lack of funds to pay, the verdict was extended by another 300 days. After the Second World War Wacker lived in the GDR.

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