CHICAGO – A federal judge in Chicago says internationally heralded artist Peter Doig did not paint a landscape work that had been valued at over $10 million and is owned by a Canadian.
The judge made the comment Tuesday as he began explaining his reasoning in the case as he led up to a verdict.
The judge says the evidence clearly showed it is a case of mistaken identity and that a different Peter Doige, who spelled his last name with an ‘e,’ actually painted it.
The unique federal case has created a stir in the art world.
Retired Canadian prison official Robert Fletcher says he bought the painting for $100 in 1976 and sued Doig for disavowing the work and causing its value to tank.
Some of Peter Doig’s paintings have sold for over $20 million and Fletcher sued for millions in damages.
READ MORE: Is this a $10M Peter Doig painting? Judge to decide on Canadian man’s lawsuit
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Fletcher, 62, of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., maintained the painting of a desert landscape with giant red rocks and a receding pond is by Doig.
If it’s not, one filing by Fletcher’s lawyers stated, “It is essentially worthless.”
Authenticity disputes typically arise long after an artist dies, not, as in this case, when the artist is still living and flatly denies a work is his. The oddity of such a dispute making it all the way to trial has drawn the interest of the wider art world.
After a week of testimony at the trial, U.S. District Judge Gary Feinerman said he would announce his verdict Tuesday. The suit was filed in Chicago because one auctioneer who had expressed interest in selling the painting is based in the city.
“All we wanted to do is find out if it’s his or not so we could go ahead and sell this painting,” Fletcher told The Canadian Press in an interview before the trial began. “We are so convinced that we have the right person.”
Fletcher contends he bought the painting from Doig around 1976 – when he says Doig was serving time on an LSD possession charge at a correctional facility in Thunder Bay, Ont., where Fletcher was employed.
It was long after he bought it that a friend saw it at Fletcher’s home and said it appeared to be by an internationally acclaimed artist.
READ MORE: Peter Doig painting of Toronto rainbow tunnel sells for $15M
Doig, who now lives in Trinidad, said he didn’t start using the linen canvas the work in question is painted on until late 1979. He also said he has never been imprisoned in Ontario or anywhere else in Canada.
And while he lived in Canada at the time, he says he was attending school over 800 kilometres away in Toronto.
Such a dispute would seem easily resolved with documentation, though Canadian prison and school records from that era were sometimes imprecise, lawyers in the case have said.
A key witness for Doig was a Canadian woman who told the court the painting is actually by her now-deceased brother, whose name was Peter Doige, with an “e,” like the signature on the disputed work.
Meanwhile, Fletcher’s lawyers suggest Doig is disavowing the painting because, if Fletcher is right, it would link him to prison in his youth.
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