مجموعة: David Henty | Master Copyist
David Henty (b. 1958) is the world's most celebrated art forger — and, crucially, the only one operating entirely in the open. Described by the BBC as "the brushstroke alchemist," he has spent over twenty-five years mastering the techniques, materials, and psychological states of history's greatest painters, producing copies so precise they have fooled scientists, art critics, and auction houses alike. Many of his early forgeries remain in major collections worldwide, their owners entirely unaware.
His path to this practice was appropriately unconventional. Arrested in the mid-1990s for passport forgery and imprisoned in both the UK and Spain, he discovered painting in prison — immersing himself in the lives and techniques of the masters as a means of mentally escaping his immediate surroundings. The discipline he developed there, working brushstroke by brushstroke through a state of deep concentration he describes as meditative, became the foundation of his entire practice. By the time he was released, he had taught himself to paint. He then spent years selling his copies through eBay as originals before being unmasked — at which point he discovered something unexpected: people wanted to buy them anyway, knowing exactly what they were.
His preparation for each painting begins long before brush touches canvas. He sources period-appropriate materials, pigments, and boards wherever possible; studies the original obsessively; and enters what he describes as a flow state in which he becomes psychologically connected to the artist he is copying. He has painted more Lowrys than Lowry. His Caravaggio, Picasso, Modigliani, Van Gogh, Basquiat, Monet, and Rossetti copies are considered practically indiscernible from the originals.
In 2022 he provided the inspiration for the art forger character at the centre of Peter James' Roy Grace novel Picture You Dead. He has appeared on Sky Arts and Sky News, and lectures on the specialised field of art forgery. Available through Creed Gallery, Ascot — where the Royal Ascot connection gives his works a particularly fitting home — for collectors across Berkshire, Surrey, and London.