Fake or Fortune

The 10th edition of Fake or Fortune is back.

Ostensibly a programme about whether an acquired painting might either be worth a fortune or, alternatively, a fake would not be the stuff of popularity but obviously it is.

Fiona Bruce, who presents The Antique Road Show, adopts the same technique of leaving right to the end the worth of the objet d’art which, truth be told, is really what the owner or owners are interested in.

The opening programme had an interesting twist as the picture – allegedly by Ben Nicholson – was a mural affixed to the wall of a cottage  and removing it was a dangerous process fraught with risk.

Fiona Bruce and her co-presenter, art dealer smoothie Philip Mould, established that Nicholson did stay in the cottage, now owned by a cheerful builder, but that is not enough to establish satisfactory provenance.

Ben Nicholson’s life was somewhat glossed over.

He was the son of painter Sir William Nicholson and his first wife Winifred, a considerable artist, came from aristocratic lineage; finding some pictures by the naive ex-fisherman Alfred Wallis outside his cottage, he sold them to the Colnaghi Gallery.

It is true he is a renowned modernist  and stalwart of the St Ives school.

The programme is contrived as the dialogue between Bruce and Mould is filmed as if impromptu but they are professional enough to give the impression of casualness; la Bruce can be a tad simpering but the formula works.

The conclusion here was that mural was the work of Nicholson – in conjunction with the then cottage owner Fred Murray an amateur artist.

The picture was removed from the wall leaving a gap which presumably the builder knew how to fill.