![]() ![]() We thereby follow Steven Shapin’s argument, in ‘The sciences of subjectivity’, that so-called subjective forms of knowledge-production merit study for how they are anchored and go beyond the idiosyncratic. In this chapter, we complement this volume’s analyses of data journeys in the sciences with an excursion into the efforts and complications of making features of artworks warrantable and witnessable in light of questions about authenticity. ![]() ![]() Yet because the determination of origins and authorship matters so greatly to the price an item can fetch on the market, the epistemic game of authentication pulls towards a binary: is it or isn’t it… The matter of art forgery is not always black and white: the lines between a fake and an unintentional misattribution, a fake and a heavily restored item, or a high-quality fake and a low-quality original, are in specific instances blurred (Jones 1990 Hook 2014). Part of the job of appraisal is precisely to distinguish a genuine Constable from “a modern painting in the style of Constable which has been oven-baked in order to produce an apparent early-nineteenth-century craquelure in the paint surface and then claimed as a genuine Constable” (Hook 2014, 212). One reason why art experts account for the possibility of deceptive appearances is the risk posed by forgeries – works intentionally designed to pass as those by a valued artist. Materials are read for their trustworthiness, and spoken of – as Martin and Lynch ( 2009, 262–263) have argued in relation to cell biology – “as agents of their own visibility and identity: as showing and hiding themselves presenting deceptive appearances obediently complying with procedures or remaining recalcitrant.” Akin to the way scientists review and process instrument traces or specimens (Lynch 1985 Amann and Knorr Cetina 1990 Halfmann this volume), a careful adjudication comes into play, a reckoning with the possibility that things may not be as they seem. The objects presented do not always make such identification and valuation easy. The surprises and reversals on the Antiques Roadshow depend on experts recognizing objects for what they are, positioning them relative to other objects (‘rare’, ‘common’, ‘exquisite’, ‘decorative’, and so on), and assigning them prospective market value. Take it home and enjoy it.’” (Hook 2014, 263). Later, as “members of the public got more and more optimistic about their property” (Hook 2014, 263), the reversal went the other way, the surprise less pleasant: “‘Value? Not very much, I’m afraid. In the early days, Impressionist and Modern Art expert Philip Hook remembers being able to deliver delightful surprises regularly, by revealing bygone objects as prized treasures. It banks on the element of surprise: frequently, what owners believe or assume about their possessions is turned on its head in the process of expert appraisal. The BBC’s Antiques Roadshow is a programme that has, for decades, featured experts travelling from town to town to appraise artworks owned by the locals. This chapter examines how experts find a place to stand as they account for the potentially unfaithful objects under their care. More though, at stake in the case of forgery is not just how individual objects get rendered discernible, but also whether there is anything to discern at all. Taking our cue from STS scholarship on the fixation and circulation of visual evidence in scientific practice, we discuss moves and techniques that point to (particular) features of a work of art to resolve authenticity questions, as well as those that point away from and negate features. The various ambivalences regarding the nature of art, of perception, and of expertise, as well as the ways in which moves and techniques (re)produce the expert-teller in fraught conditions, bring a shiftiness to the constitution of data and evidence in this domain. We examine how relations between tellers and audiences are configured – who can be trusted, and what can be relied on when it comes to knowing the real from the forged. This chapter approaches questions about data and data journeys by examining demonstrations of fakery and expertise in popular accounts by forgers and their pursuers. ![]()
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