Divine Comedy? Divine Tragedy? Or Divine Farce?

The Great Park West Dali Half Million Dollar Swindle. Part 2

Part 2 of a 32-minute, two-part documentary in which experts examine a set of Salvador Dali Divine Comedy prints, sold by Park West to two London based lawyers, for over half a million dollars. Examination of the prints show them to be genuine Dali woodblock prints BUT each with a FORGED Dali signature. The prints without the signatures would be worth about $10,000. The prints with genuine Dali signatures would be worth $30-50,000. The prints as they are, with forged signatures, are worth nothing. The video shows how Park West and Royal Caribbean International swindled Sharon Day and Julian Howard out of over half a million dollars. But the story is not over.

Divine Comedy? Divine Tragedy? Divine Farce!

It was a strange gathering in the warehouse environment at MANA Fine Art Storage in Jersey City, NJ, on Monday 8 December 2008. Sharon Day, a London, England based lawyer, but here on this occasion as a former passenger of Royal Caribbean cruise lines and Park West Gallery. Mr. Nicolas Descharnes, of Paris France, an internationally recognized expert on Salvador Dali original art and on Dali fakes. Frank Hunter, Director of the Salvador Dali Archives in New York who helped Albert Field compile the famous Official Guide to the Graphic Works of Salvador Dali, himself a world renowned expert on Salvador Dali graphic works. Joe Barabe, an expert in microscopy and scientific forensic examination specializing in art, with McCrone Group of Westmont, IL. Shaul Shemesh, Operations Manager of MANA Fine Art storage in Jersey City, NJ. Teri Franks, CEO of Fine Art Registry®. And a video team.

The occasion was the filming of a documentary video produced by Fine Art Registry. The subject of the documentary was the opening and expert examination of a crate which was supposed to contain a full, rare and valuable complete set of Salvador Dalí's 100 beautiful woodcut prints illustrating Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, all hand signed in pencil by the great Spanish surrealist artist himself. Sharon Day and her husband Julian Howard paid Park West $450,000 plus $67,506 "buyer's premium" (even though the sale was not at auction), totaling $517,506 for these prints. This was the first time the contents of the crate had been seen by Sharon or Julian. The results of the examination were, to say the least, shocking.

The full length documentary is one and a half hours long. This is Part 2 of a two-part shorter version. Each part is about 16 minutes long.

The documentary, filmed, edited and produced by Fine Art Registry, tells what was found when the box was opened and the contents examined by the experts. A clue to their findings is the fact that they estimate the total value of the $517,506.00 shipment to be exactly $0.

The story begins on Part 1

Video by Fine Art Registry, December 22, 2008   |   Discuss Story on FAR® Forum   |   Print   |  

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