Bamboozling Ourselves (Part 1) - Errol Morris Blog - NYTimes.com
http://morris.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/27/bamboozling-ourselves-part-1/

Bamboozling Ourselves (Part 1)

"To be sure, the Van Meegeren story raises many, many questions. Among them: what makes a work of art great? Is it the signature of (or attribution to) an acknowledged master? Is it just a name? Or is it a name implying a provenance? With a photograph we may be interested in the photographer but also in what the photograph is of. With a painting this is often turned around, we may be interested in what the painting is of, but we are primarily interested in the question: who made it? Who held a brush to canvas and painted it? Whether it is the work of an acclaimed master like Vermeer or a duplicitous forger like Van Meegeren — we want to know more."

Han van Meegeren

Long OpEd piece on a fake Vermeer and Nazi ties in Amsterdam