Han van Meegeren

Han van Meegeren (1889–1947) was a Dutch painter who forged paintings and sold several as works by Johannes Vermeer. His fraud became notorious after the Second World War, when he confessed to selling a forged Vermeer to Nazi leader Hermann Göring.

The Supper at Emmaus (van Meegeren): A 1930s painting by Han van Meegeren, presented as a newly discovered work by Johannes Vermeer. This acclaimed forgery helped establish van Meegeren’s reputation as a Vermeer expert.
Vermeer forgeries: Paintings made by Han van Meegeren and falsely attributed to Johannes Vermeer. These works were the main products of van Meegeren’s most lucrative fraud.
Deventer: A city in the eastern Netherlands where Han van Meegeren was born in 1889. Van Meegeren’s Dutch upbringing preceded his training and later forgery career.
Nazi looted art: Artwork seized, coerced, or otherwise unlawfully acquired by Nazi Germany and its agents. Van Meegeren’s sale to Göring surfaced during investigations into Nazi-held art after the war.
Christ with the Adulteress: A painting by Han van Meegeren that he sold as a work by Johannes Vermeer to Hermann Göring. Its sale to Göring became central evidence in van Meegeren’s postwar trial.
Bakelite: An early synthetic plastic resin used in varnishes, electrical goods, and molded objects. Van Meegeren used a Bakelite-based mixture to make paint appear centuries old.
Royal Academy of Art, The Hague: An art academy in The Hague that provides professional training in visual arts. Van Meegeren studied there and developed the painting skills later used in his forgeries.
Art authentication: The evaluation of an artwork’s authorship, date, materials, and provenance. The case showed how confident expert attribution could fail without material analysis.
Hermann Göring: A leading Nazi official who served as commander of the Luftwaffe and amassed a vast art collection. Göring acquired a forged Vermeer from van Meegeren during the German occupation.
X-ray fluorescence: An analytical technique that identifies elements in a material by measuring its emitted X-rays. Elemental analysis helped expose pigments in van Meegeren’s paintings that postdated Vermeer.

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ConnoisseurshipBroader topic: His forgeries challenged experts’ confidence in stylistic attribution.