In the early 2000s, Bill Mayberry, president of Mayberry Fine Art, had just placed a newspaper ad promoting a painting by renowned Ojibwe artist Norval Morrisseau, considered the grandfather of the Woodland school of art. He was looking forward to calls from prospective buyers. Instead he got a warning that has stuck with him for two decades.“Ritchie told me the painting I was selling was a fake,” Mr. Mayberry recalls. “I immediately gave it back to the consignor.
The announcement came as a relief to Mr. Mayberry, Mr. Sinclair and a handful of academics, artists and collectors who have risked personal harassment and legal liability to identify suspected fakes over the years. He eventually developed a keen eye for suspicious Morrisseaus. But with the whiff of scandal hanging over Woodland work, prices hit a ceiling.
By comparison, Mr. Mayberry said that prices for work by contemporary Quebec artist Jean-Paul Riopelle range between $100,000 and $4-million. Others have taken up the battle in spite of legal and professional pressure. In about 2008, Mr. Sinclair established a website displaying upward of 1,000 Morrisseau pieces he identified as forgeries. Since then he’s faced extensive litigation from collectors and gallery owners whose inventory he placed under suspicion. One gallery owner, Joe McLeod,
Some, however, formed the Norval Morrisseau Heritage Society to catalogue works that could be reliably traced to the late master. And several are now working on the Morrisseau Project, aimed at creating a database and comprehensive book of verified work produced between 1955 and 1985.