Know this guy? Jasper Johns’s Ex-Assistant Charged With Stolen Works Sale (2) 2013-08-15 19:54:19.855 GMT (Updates with auction sale in 10th paragraph.) By Don Jeffrey and Katya Kazakina Aug. 15 (Bloomberg) -- A former longtime assistant to the painter Jasper Johns was charged with selling 22 artworks he allegedly stole from the artist’s studio in Sharon, Connecticut, for $6.5 million. James Meyer, who was Johns’s assistant for more than 25 years, was arrested at his home yesterday in Salisbury, Connecticut, and appeared in federal court in Hartford, U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in Manhattan said in a statement. From 2006 to 2012 Meyer removed 22 of the artist’s works from a studio file drawer and took them to an art gallery in Manhattan to sell without Johns’s permission, according to an indictment unsealed today. The works were pieces Johns, 83, hadn’t yet completed and hadn’t authorized for sale, according to the filing. Meyer told the gallery owner the works were gifts, prosecutors said. The gallery, which wasn’t identified, sold the works for $6.5 million, of which Meyer received $3.4 million, according to the indictment. He was charged with interstate transportation of stolen property and wire fraud. Fake Pages Meyer created fake inventory numbers for the pieces to give the impression they were finished works and authorized by Johns to be sold, according to the indictment. He also created fake pages for the works he inserted into a ledger book of registered pieces, the U.S. said. These pages, which he photographed, contained notes that the works had been “gifted” to Meyer. The photographed pages were e-mailed by the gallery to prospective buyers. Johns couldn’t be reached for comment. Matthew Marks Gallery, the gallery in Manhattan that represents Johns, declined to comment on the case. A lawyer for Meyer couldn’t immediately be located. Meyer required each buyer to sign an agreement that the artworks be kept private for at least eight years and not loaned, exhibited or re-sold during that time, the U.S. said. One of the most important living American artists, Johns is known for his paintings of the American flag, targets, numbers and letters. In 2008, an exhibition of his work, “Jasper Johns: Gray,” was shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. His auction record of $28.6 million was set in 2010 at Christie’s in New York for the painting “Flag,” which once hung in the bedroom of author Michael Crichton in his Los Angeles home. “Flag” was created between 1960 and 1966 with wax encaustic and newspaper. Gallery Show Meyer is an artist whose most recent exhibition, “Shadow,” was shown through April 27 at Gering & Lopez Gallery in Manhattan. His watercolors depicted a shadowy figure of a boy playing with a water bucket in a field. Earlier works showed children playing hide-and-seek and jumping through hula hoops. Meyer attended the School of Visual Arts in New York and became Johns’s studio assistant in 1985, according to his website. Meyer lives with his wife, Amy Jenkins, and their two children and helped develop an after-school art studio at a high school where students work on projects under the supervision of local artists, according to his website. The case is U.S. v. Meyer, 13-cr-00604, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan). For Related News and Information: Top stories: TOP Top legal stories: TLAW Bloomberg legal resources: BLAW --Editors: Mary Romano, Charles Carter To contact the reporters on this story: Don Jeffrey in New York at +1-212-617-4876 or [email protected]; Katya Kazakina in New York at [email protected] or +1-212-617-4837
Posted on: Thu, 15 Aug 2013 20:43:57 +0000
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