The Conman
The Extraordinary Story How One Amateur with a Pot of Emulsion Paint Mixed with KY Jelly Fooled the Art Experts

How does the art market work? It is a mystery to most, but this did not deter conman John Drewe. This meticulously researched book uncovers both the day to day business of art galleries and, in a riveting tale, how the conman perpetrated his decade-long fraud.

When a school teacher put a modest advertisement in Private Eye as a painter of 'genuine fakes', he had no idea that it would lead to him becoming a willing part of the biggest art fraud in Britain. Among one of the few people who responded was the mysterious and magnetic John Drewe, apparently a Professor and inventor with impressive connections. But really Drewe was a conman who was soon to take in the British Modern Art World with a scam that would last a decade. Drewe, who knew, at first, little about the art world discovered that the art itself didn't really make any difference but it was the documentation of a work that mattered. He commissioned some 200 works from Myatt who worked with B&Q emulsion paint, mixed in with KY jelly, over a decade. It was only a naked a woman and a microwaved goldfish that would end the scam!

Dramatis Personae vii Prologue 1 1
I Want a Nice MatisseA" 7 2 Canvas Greed 15 3 Art for Sale 25 4 Crossing the Line 33 5 Mibus Wants His Money Back 38 6 Self-Made Man 45 7 Wreckers of Civilization 55 8 At the Easel 64 9 The Fine Art of Provenance 72 10 Full Speed Ahead 82 11 After Giacometti 91 12 A Sinister Message 100 13 The Bookworm 107 14 The Paper Trail 115 15 Falling off a Log 122 16 The Bow Tie 130 17 Into the Whirlwind 136 18 Standing Nude 146 19 The Pond Man 150 20 Myatt's Blue Period 160 21 The Chameleon 170 22 A Loaded Briefcase 178 23 The Auschwitz Concert 185 24 Extreme Prudence 194 25 We're Not Alone 199 26 A Slow Burn - 203 27 The Art Squad 211 28 The Macaroni Caper 218 29 Nicked 226 30 Aladdin's Cave 232 31 The Fox 248 32 Drewe Descending 262 33 South 273 34 The Trial 281 Epilogue 291 Authors' Note 307 Acknowledgments 309 Bibliography 313 Endnotes 317 Index 321