the years the museum became home to some of the country’s best-known artworks, including Henry Turner’s luminous Golden Bough; William Blake’s portrait of Isaac Newton; canine masterpieces such as Hogarth’s Self-Portrait with Dog and Gainsborough’s Pomeranian Bitch and Puppy; and Stanley Spencer’s weird and wonderful The Resurrection, Cookham, a tableau mort showing a village of dead Englishmen squinting into the sunlight as they emerge from their graves. By the time the Tate began to add daring contemporary works by twentieth-century iconoclasts such as Duchamp and Francis Bacon, it was one of the world’s most famous art institutions.
For the past few months Drewe had been masquerading as a rich scientist with a large collection of modern art, a front that was now well documented in Sotheby’s ICA benefit auction catalog, whose acknowledgment page thanked Drewe’s company, Norseland, for its “generous donation” of a Giacometti and a Le Corbusier. He had also begun his campaign of wining and dining the Tate’s senior staff, many of whom had been his guests at Claridge’s, where Drewe was a regular and was treated like royalty. Sometimes he came in early and sat alone, surrounded by half a dozen waiters, a sommelier, and a maître d’. From an adjacent table one might have thought he was a cultural anthropologist doing fieldwork on the aristocracy, a kind of Lévi-Strauss of the Limoges set.
Drewe believed that by now Sarah Fox-Pitt in particular had come to see him as an ally. At every opportunity he’d appealed to her enthusiasm for augmenting the Tate archives. He’d offered himself up as a middleman who could connect the Tate with important documentary records. He’d said he had evidence as to the whereabouts of some intriguing wayward papers, and he’d shown Fox-Pitt a handwritten letter purportedly from Bill McAlister, who had since left the ICA. The letter, which Drewe had forged, described the location of a rich cache of art-related archives that had been moved to New York. Drewe proposed to retrieve them. In addition, he’d hinted at possible donations and talked compellingly about his project of putting together a computer database that would chronicle the history of contemporary British art.
Fox-Pitt had done her part to sustain the relationship with Drewe, calling him at home and inviting him to the Tate to discuss future plans. Throughout this courtship dance, despite her vaunted powers of observation, Drewe managed to impress his way into the upper echelons at the Tate. Evidently Drewe could spot psychic vulnerability much better than Fox-Pitt could spot a poseur, and he had gradually worn down her caution. He knew just the right moment to weave a little fact into the fiction, whether it was the name of a recent acquaintance such as Jane Drew or the mention of his company in the ICA catalog. Now it was time to make his move.
The two Bissières Myatt had dropped off the day before seemed perfect for the Tate: lively, colorful, pleasing to the eye. Drewe could easily whip up a credible provenance with the material he already had. He called the Tate and made the offer, and within days the paintings had been delivered to the museum.
Drewe called Myatt with the good news that the gatekeepers of the temple on the Thames were arranging a reception in their honor. He said he’d made a substantial donation to the Tate and that director Nicholas Serota and other top staffers would be in attendance. He emphasized the importance of the reception, which would give him the credibility he needed to gain access to the museum’s research room. He wanted his personal art historian there to cover him in case a Tate official asked a difficult question.
“Put your best suit on,” he said. “This is going to be the start of a lovely relationship.”
Myatt cringed. Surely he would stumble. Never in a million years would he be able to field queries from the Tate’s exalted experts. His botched
For the past few months Drewe had been masquerading as a rich scientist with a large collection of modern art, a front that was now well documented in Sotheby’s ICA benefit auction catalog, whose acknowledgment page thanked Drewe’s company, Norseland, for its “generous donation” of a Giacometti and a Le Corbusier. He had also begun his campaign of wining and dining the Tate’s senior staff, many of whom had been his guests at Claridge’s, where Drewe was a regular and was treated like royalty. Sometimes he came in early and sat alone, surrounded by half a dozen waiters, a sommelier, and a maître d’. From an adjacent table one might have thought he was a cultural anthropologist doing fieldwork on the aristocracy, a kind of Lévi-Strauss of the Limoges set.
Drewe believed that by now Sarah Fox-Pitt in particular had come to see him as an ally. At every opportunity he’d appealed to her enthusiasm for augmenting the Tate archives. He’d offered himself up as a middleman who could connect the Tate with important documentary records. He’d said he had evidence as to the whereabouts of some intriguing wayward papers, and he’d shown Fox-Pitt a handwritten letter purportedly from Bill McAlister, who had since left the ICA. The letter, which Drewe had forged, described the location of a rich cache of art-related archives that had been moved to New York. Drewe proposed to retrieve them. In addition, he’d hinted at possible donations and talked compellingly about his project of putting together a computer database that would chronicle the history of contemporary British art.
Fox-Pitt had done her part to sustain the relationship with Drewe, calling him at home and inviting him to the Tate to discuss future plans. Throughout this courtship dance, despite her vaunted powers of observation, Drewe managed to impress his way into the upper echelons at the Tate. Evidently Drewe could spot psychic vulnerability much better than Fox-Pitt could spot a poseur, and he had gradually worn down her caution. He knew just the right moment to weave a little fact into the fiction, whether it was the name of a recent acquaintance such as Jane Drew or the mention of his company in the ICA catalog. Now it was time to make his move.
The two Bissières Myatt had dropped off the day before seemed perfect for the Tate: lively, colorful, pleasing to the eye. Drewe could easily whip up a credible provenance with the material he already had. He called the Tate and made the offer, and within days the paintings had been delivered to the museum.
Drewe called Myatt with the good news that the gatekeepers of the temple on the Thames were arranging a reception in their honor. He said he’d made a substantial donation to the Tate and that director Nicholas Serota and other top staffers would be in attendance. He emphasized the importance of the reception, which would give him the credibility he needed to gain access to the museum’s research room. He wanted his personal art historian there to cover him in case a Tate official asked a difficult question.
“Put your best suit on,” he said. “This is going to be the start of a lovely relationship.”
Myatt cringed. Surely he would stumble. Never in a million years would he be able to field queries from the Tate’s exalted experts. His botched
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