Fake or Fortune?
| Fake or Fortune? | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Genre | Documentary |
| Presented by | |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of series | 6 |
| No. of episodes | 22 |
| Production | |
| Producer(s) | Simon Shaw |
| Running time | 60 minutes |
| Release | |
| Original network | BBC One |
| Original release | 19 June 2011 – present |
Fake or Fortune? is a BBC One television series which examines the provenance and attribution of notable artworks. Since the first series aired in 2011, Fake or Fortune? has drawn audiences of 5 million viewers in the UK, the highest for an arts show in that country.
Fake or Fortune? is co-presented by journalist Fiona Bruce and art dealer and art historian Philip Mould with specialist research carried out by Dr. Bendor Grosvenor during the first five seasons. Forensic analysis and archival research is carried out by various fine art specialists. Each series first aired on BBC One, except the third series accidentally first aired on SVT. The sixth series began in August 2017.
In each episode, Philip Mould and Fiona Bruce focus their attention on a painting (or a group of paintings), usually related to one particular artist. The team, assisted by Bendor Grosvenor in series 1 to 5, investigate the paintings on a number of fronts: establishing the provenance of the piece by working backwards from present day to the time of the work's creation; on a forensic level, with investigation and scientific tests on the materials used to help establish specific time frames; and examining the unique painting styles and quirks of the artist. This evidence is then presented to established authorities to help demonstrate the legitimacy of the work and its possible addition to the relevant catalogue raisonné.
There were four episodes in the first series, which started on 19 June 2011:
Bords de la Seine à Argenteuil
Children Under a Palm Tree
The Procuress
Man in an Oriental Costume
The first episode of the second series was shown in the UK on 16 September 2012. The series had three episodes:
Turner – The Beacon Light
Turner – Off Margate
Turner – Margate Jetty
Van Dyck – Portrait of Queen Henrietta Maria, as St Catherine before restoration
The third series features four episodes. The first episode was first shown on 27 December 2013, on Sweden's SVT, with episodes 2 and 3 shown in the following weeks. Philip Mould described the appearance on Swedish television weeks ahead of the British premiere as a "weird BBC World cock-up". SVT on its website described the programme at the time as a "Brittisk dokumentärserie från 2012" (British documentary from 2012).
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Wikipedia