The once-celebrated Knoedler & Company gallery has been closed for more than a year and a half but the lawsuits keep coming. Last week, the philanthropist and former ambassador to Romania, Nicholas F. Taubman, became the sixth former client to sue the gallery in federal court in Manhattan, charging that Knoedler’s former director Ann Freedman duped him into buying a fake painting by Clyfford Still for $4.3 million in 2005.
This painting was exhibited as genuine in the U.S. embassy in Bucharest while Mr. Taubman and wife, Eugenia, were stationed there. According to the lawsuit, a forensic analysis commissioned by Mr. Taubman showed the work, “Untitled (1949),†was a forgery.
The suit, reported earlier by The Baer Faxt, an art industry newsletter, also names as part of the conspiracy Knoedler’s owner Michael Hammer and the Long Island dealer Glafira Rosales, who supplied the gallery with dozens of paintings that were credited to American masters like Still, Jackson Pollock, Robert Motherwell, and Mark Rothko. Ms. Rosales was identified last year as the target of an F.B.I. investigation.
Ms. Freedman has maintained all the works provided by Ms. Rosales are authentic.
“This lawsuit simply copies allegations that have already been discredited in the earlier lawsuits,†said her lawyer, Nicholas A. Gravante Jr.
Ms. Rosales’ lawyer has said that she has never knowingly sold any forged works. Knoedler’s lawyer, Charles D. Schmerler, said “The Taubman complaint relies on the same unproven and baseless claims contained in the prior lawsuits.†opycat litigation
