Two forged Pablo Picasso prints were sold at an auction house in Stuttgart while German authorities managed to seize two additional counterfeits before they could be auctioned, police said last week.
An Italian national is suspected of introducing high-quality forgeries of works from Picasso's "Suite Vollard" series into the international art market over a period of years.
The fakes made their way into the Stuttgart auction house, theB aden-Württemberg State Criminal Police Office (LKA) said in a statement.
Of the two fakes that were sold, one was seized at an art dealer in the city of Worms, while the other is currently located in Austria.
Italy's Carabinieri art crime unit in Rome took action against the suspect in early July. Authorities have not disclosed further details on the investigation.
Germany's state police offices in Baden-Württemberg and Berlin have been working on the case for several years, in close cooperation with the Picasso Museum in Münster, which confirmed the artworks were counterfeit. A total of seven forged prints linked to the suspect and his network have been recovered so far, according to the LKA.
The "Suite Vollard" is a celebrated series of 100 etchings created by Picasso between 1930 and 1937, commissioned by art dealer and publisher Ambroise Vollard. The collection is widely regarded as one of Picasso's most important graphic works. —dpa
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