The Wine Forger’s Handbook: A Brief History of Wine Forgery ( CHAPTER ONE)

November 1986. Andy Warhol’s Big Campbell’s Soup Can sells at auction for $264,000, while a case of Château Lafite Rothschild 1982 sells for the current equivalent of $520 per case. Fast-forward to November 2010, and that same Warhol sells at a New York auction for $23,882,500 (including premium), an increase of over 900%. That same year, across the world in Hong Kong, the case of Lafite sells for $109,660—21,000% over the 1986 price.

The astronomical increase in value of both fine art and fine wine, even in times of economic recession, prompts investors and entrepreneurs, legitimate and illicit alike. The surge in demand for fine wine over the last decade, particularly in Asia, has motivated fraudsters. Anything that is valuable, whether it is a painting or a bottle of wine, is in danger of being faked.

CHAPTER ONE

An Apple a day
Apple stores are ubiquitous in Chinese cities but the American company has only six official shops in Mainland China. Beijing officially deplores the country’s inexorable production of fakes but in practice turns a blind eye, though things are improving slowly, with the Chinese government beginning to accept denominated wine names as legally binding. On October 11, 2012, China accepted to recognize and to protect the Napa Valley denomination. It took Napa Valley vintners 14 years of trade missions and talks to achieve this. France has nearly 500 wine names to protect, which suggests that by the year 9012 every French wine’s name will be protected in the Chinese market.

Fake wines allegedly flow in and out of Hong Kong like the cheap and illegal Irish reprints of books that flooded the British market in the 18th century. Part of the problem is that the concept of fakes, like the idea of copyrights or intellectual property, differs significantly in China from the strict parameters of the West. Emerging economies like China’s have less dense retail structures, with many small independent retailers sourcing goods on the grey market rather than large stores with robust supply chains.

China’s nonchalance results in a flood of counterfeit goods into Western markets. For many people, it is admittedly attractive to purchase a luxury good at below the market price. But if something is much less expensive than it should be then something is not right.

The art and wine markets of the 21st century would not be out of place in an Umberto Eco novel, full of fakes, forgeries, and dark conspiracies. The art of forgery is as old as the arts themselves.

Unadulterated tales
Adulteration of wine—adding different or inferior wine to a superior and genuine wine—has a long history. The Roman philosopher Pliny the Elder complained that “genuine, unadulterated wine is not to be had now, not even by the nobility.” He was referring to fraudulent examples of Falernian, the most luxurious wine of Ancient Rome. Then, as now, the most sought-after wines were most in danger of being reproduced illicitly.

In Medieval London it was illegal for tavern keepers to keep French and Spanish wines together in the same cellar with German wines, an easily circumvented attempt to prevent mixing or substitution.

“The Pardoner’s Tale,” one of Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, relates:

Now kepe yow fro the white and fro the rede,
And namely, fro the white wyn of Lepe,
That is to selle in fysshstrete, or in Chepe.
This wyn of Spaigne crepeth subtilly
In othere wynes, growynge faste by,
Of which ther ryseth swich fumositee,
That whan a man hath dronken draughtes thre
And weneth that he be at hoom in Chepe,
He is in Spaigne, right at the toune of Lepe,
Nat at the Rochele, ne at Burdeux toun…

Chaucer, who was himself a “messenger” (sometimes described as a “spy”) for King Edward III, knew a thing or two about deception. His father was a London-based vintner, so he knew a thing or two about wine as well. Chaucer warns that Bordeaux wines are being substituted with less expensive Spanish plonk. Concern that what is on your wine label is not what is inside the bottle is nothing new.

In the 19th century it was common practice for thinner Bordeaux and Burgundy wines to be “cut” or “improved” with fuller Rhône wines, leading to the informal (and strictly unofficial) wine term “Hermitagé”—“Hermitaged” by the deep-colored red wine of that name.

In 2008 several producers of Brunello di Montalcino—one of Italy’s most prestigious red wines—were accused of adding wine from Puglia—dark, intense reds not unlike Hermitage—to their supposedly pure Sangiovese wines. The “scandal” hit sales: Imports to the USA were banned for several months.

“Doctor Barolet” bottlings of Burgundies from the early- to mid-20th century were known for richness of flavor; it was alleged that the barrels were topped-up with Cognac. In Bristol, England, the famous old firm of Avery’s used to ship and bottle Burgundies that to some tasters had a pronounced sweetness—due, it was claimed, to fruit liqueurs being added.

Frederick Accum’s 1820 “Treatise on Adulterations” criticized the adulteration of wines. The wine dealer who “practices this dangerous sophistication, adds the crime of murder to that of fraud, and deliberately scatters the seeds of disease and death among those consumers who contribute to his emolument.” This may sound a little harsh but a brief conversation with a collector (let’s call him William Koch for now) who has been defrauded into purchasing fake wine will show that being fooled is taken personally—and the victims are often out for blood.

Chinese whispers
No one was ever physically harmed by a fake painting (unless it was dropped on their foot) but adulterated or fake wine poses a potential health risk. This is especially the case in China, where food safety regulations are still lax, and where many counterfeit luxury goods originate. In March 2011 the official Xinhua news agency reported, “the quality of food safety supervision and inspection would be a primary task in 2011.” It may be a case of too little, too late.

China, it seems, is the main source of large-scale fraudulent wine, as well as other counterfeit luxury goods. A 2008 study of illicit luxury goods entering the United States (estimated at $287 billion per year in illegal profits), found that 85% of all counterfeit luxury goods, from Gucci handbags to fine wines, came out of China.

Reliable figures for wine fraud are difficult to come by. It is easy for law enforcement agencies and other interested parties to see fraud on a local (that is, city or state) level. But it is extremely difficult to ascertain how much fraud is committed at a national and international level.

AOC = AOK?
Fraudulent attempts at replicating French classics led to the creation of the Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée laws, which are intended to protect the producer and consumer. As Cyrus Redding wrote in 1833, “The best test against adulterated wine is a perfect acquaintance with that which is good.” This is easier said than done, however. Particularly for truly rare wines, like anything produced in the 18th century, there are few people who have tasted the real thing and therefore have a point of comparison. When the now-well-known Hardy Rodenstock’s “Jefferson Lafites” were assessed, no one knew what they should taste like.

One must keep in mind, however, that adulteration is not necessarily fraudulent. In Ancient Greece, for example, wine was often diluted with water. The inferior wines of Galatia were usually cut with pine resin to make them drinkable. Nowadays this is called Retsina—and it’s still undrinkable.

“Once a flock bed, but repaired with straw”
The most controversial type of wine adulteration is “reconditioning”—the vinous equivalent of an old painting being “restored.” For some people, it can give a new lease of life to an old wine and increase its drinkability and longevity. Typically reconditioning is done at the relevant wine-producing château, using a younger vintage of the same wine. A new cork will also be inserted. (Recorking bottles is difficult, requiring proper equipment and significant expertise.) This also serves as a de facto method of authenticating a bottle and establishing provenance.

But some see reconditioning or restoration as akin to polishing an old coin: you may end up wearing it down rather than making it brighter. Paintings, like wines, are sensitive to their environment and change with time. If an old wine has got something else (and something much younger) in it, is it still the real thing? At any rate, some old wines are better than others. Plenty of poor quality wines have been reconditioned and sold for more than they might otherwise have fetched.

Art has euphemistic terms of attribution: “attributed to”; “studio of”; workshop of”; “follower of”; “circle of”; and “imitator of.” An exact duplicate is a “replica.” In 2004 the Groningen Museum in Belgium held an exhibition entitled “Fake or Not Fake,” featuring the restoration work of a leading mid-20th century conservator, Jozef (Jef) van der Veken. Van der Veken had restored with so heavy a hand that there was more van der Veken in his Memlings than there was Memling. He was also a recognized forger, having passed off some of his own handiwork as 15th century Flemish Primitives. He even managed to trick Hermann Göring into buying one during the Second World War.

There are significant parallels between art and wine fraud, aside from the fact that, in theory at least, one is intended ultimately to be consumed. No one doubts van der Veken’s ability as a painter, although many would prefer that he restored with a lighter touch that did not seek to deceive the viewer into confounding what was original with what was new.

Wine, on the other hand, is authentic or it is nothing at all. There can be no “imitator” of Lafite.