Han van Meegeren: The Master Forger Who Fooled the Nazis and Became a National Hero

Dutch Master Forger Who Fooled the Nazis (1889-1947)

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Early Life and Artistic Training

Henricus Antonius “Han” van Meegeren was born on October 10, 1889, in the provincial Dutch city of Deventer, the third of five children. His father, Hendrikus Johannes van Meegeren, taught French and history at a local teacher training college and held strict views about practical careers. The elder Van Meegeren strictly forbade his son’s artistic development, constantly deriding his ambitions and forcing young Han to write lines declaring “I know nothing, I am nothing, I am capable of nothing.” This cruel dismissal planted seeds of resentment that would later fuel Van Meegeren’s determination to prove himself.

Despite his father’s opposition, Van Meegeren found an unlikely ally in Bartus Korteling, a teacher and painter at his school who recognized the boy’s exceptional talent. Korteling became Van Meegeren’s mentor, introducing him to the techniques of the Dutch Golden Age masters—particularly Johannes Vermeer. Korteling rejected Impressionism and modern art movements as degenerate, instilling in Van Meegeren a deep appreciation for classical technique and a corresponding disdain for contemporary art criticism. This aesthetic conservatism would define Van Meegeren’s entire artistic philosophy.

Compelled by his father to pursue a practical profession, Van Meegeren enrolled in architecture studies at the Delft University of Technology in 1907. Though he complied outwardly, Van Meegeren continued developing his artistic skills. In 1913, he received the prestigious Gold Medal from Delft University for his “Study of the Interior of the Church of Saint Lawrence in Rotterdam”—an award given only every five years to the art student who created the finest work. Van Meegeren abandoned architecture and enrolled at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, where he completed his diploma examination in 1914 and took a position as assistant to the Professor of Drawing and Art History.

The Frustrated Artist

Van Meegeren’s first exhibition was held in April-May 1917 at Kunstzaal Pictura in The Hague, and his early career showed genuine promise. He achieved success as a portraitist and society painter, executing competent works in traditional styles that found buyers among the Dutch bourgeoisie. Van Meegeren’s technical skills were never in question—his draftsmanship and handling of paint demonstrated thorough academic training and natural ability. The problem lay elsewhere.

Art critics of the 1920s and 1930s dismissed Van Meegeren’s original works as derivative and retrograde. In an era celebrating Cubism, Surrealism, and abstraction, Van Meegeren’s devotion to seventeenth-century aesthetics seemed hopelessly outdated. Critics characterized his paintings as technically proficient but spiritually empty—mere imitation without innovation. Van Meegeren felt these assessments were unjust attacks by an establishment that valued novelty over mastery, and he grew increasingly bitter toward the art world that had rejected him.

This resentment crystallized into a plan. Van Meegeren decided to prove that critics could not distinguish genuine old master paintings from modern creations—that their expertise was fraudulent and their judgments worthless. He would create forgeries so perfect that the very experts who had dismissed his original work would proclaim his fakes as masterpieces. When the deception was revealed, Van Meegeren would expose the critics as charlatans and vindicate his own artistic abilities. It was a revenge fantasy that consumed six years of meticulous preparation.

“Van Meegeren’s forgeries represent a perfect storm of technical skill, psychological insight, and historical timing—he understood not just how to paint like Vermeer, but how experts wanted to see Vermeer.”

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The Science of Deception

In 1932, Van Meegeren relocated to a rented mansion in the south of France, where he spent six years perfecting the technical processes necessary to create undetectable forgeries. Van Meegeren understood that fooling experts required solving multiple scientific problems. Oil paintings take years to fully dry, and the standard forensic test of the era involved swabbing alcohol onto the paint surface and attempting to insert a heated needle—any paint residue on the swab or easy needle penetration indicated recent creation. Van Meegeren needed to artificially age his paintings by centuries.

His breakthrough came through chemistry. Van Meegeren mixed his pigments with phenol formaldehyde—a component of Bakelite, the recently invented early plastic. When the finished painting was baked at low temperatures for several hours, the Bakelite hardened the paint surface and produced an authentic-looking craquelure (the network of fine cracks that develops in old paintings as paint and varnish age). The phenol formaldehyde also prevented the alcohol test from revealing fresh paint. Van Meegeren added lilac oil to his mixtures to prevent colors from fading or yellowing during the baking process.

Van Meegeren’s attention to materials was equally meticulous. He purchased authentic seventeenth-century canvases, carefully removing existing paintings while preserving the aged fabric. He mixed his own paints from raw materials using period formulas—lapis lazuli for ultramarine blue, white lead, indigo, and cinnabar—avoiding modern pigments that spectroscopic analysis might detect. Van Meegeren even crafted badger-hair paintbrushes similar to those Vermeer was known to have used, ensuring that brushwork texture would match genuine examples.

Beyond technical matters, Van Meegeren demonstrated sophisticated understanding of art historical psychology. Rather than copying existing Vermeers—which would invite direct comparison—he created “undiscovered” works that filled gaps in the known catalog. Art historians had long speculated that Vermeer must have painted religious subjects early in his career, though no such works had survived. Van Meegeren exploited this scholarly desire, creating Biblical scenes that appeared to confirm expert theories. The forgeries succeeded not merely because they looked authentic, but because experts wanted them to exist.

Supper at Emmaus: The Masterpiece Forgery

Van Meegeren’s greatest triumph came in 1937 with “Supper at Emmaus,” a large canvas depicting Christ revealing himself to two disciples at an inn—a subject from the Gospel of Luke. The painting represented everything art historians hoped to find: an early Vermeer religious work showing the master’s development before his famous domestic scenes. Van Meegeren had created exactly what scholarship predicted should exist.

The painting was submitted for authentication to Dr. Abraham Bredius, the foremost Vermeer scholar of the age. Bredius examined the work and declared it authentic in a landmark article published in The Burlington Magazine, proclaiming “Supper at Emmaus” to be “the masterpiece of Johannes Vermeer of Delft.” Bredius’s endorsement carried enormous weight—his pronouncement effectively certified the painting as genuine. Other experts fell into line, each confirming what the great authority had declared.

Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam moved quickly to acquire the newly discovered masterpiece, competing against the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. With financial support from the Rembrandt Society and wealthy ship owner Willem van der Vorm, the museum purchased “Supper at Emmaus” for 520,000 guilders—approximately €4.5 million in today’s currency. The painting became the museum’s star attraction, drawing crowds eager to witness what experts called Vermeer’s finest religious work. Van Meegeren had achieved his revenge: the critics who dismissed his original paintings had acclaimed his forgery as a masterpiece.

Yet Van Meegeren never revealed his authorship. The money proved too tempting, and the praise too intoxicating. Rather than exposing the deception, Van Meegeren continued producing forgeries throughout the late 1930s and into World War II. He created additional “Vermeers” and works attributed to Pieter de Hooch, Gerard ter Borch, and Frans Hals, selling them to collectors and dealers who never questioned provenance. Van Meegeren’s revenge fantasy had transformed into something simpler: profitable fraud.

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The Nazi Sale and Its Consequences

During the German occupation of the Netherlands, Van Meegeren continued his forgery business, now dealing with buyers connected to the Nazi regime. In 1942, he sold a painting titled “Christ and the Adulteress”—another purported early Vermeer religious work—through intermediaries to Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring. Göring, who was assembling one of history’s largest collections of looted and purchased art, traded 137 paintings for the supposed Vermeer. The Nazi leader considered it one of his most prized possessions, unaware that he had exchanged genuine Dutch masters for a modern fake.

Van Meegeren’s wartime dealings would prove nearly fatal. When Allied forces liberated the Netherlands in 1945, investigators established commissions to identify and recover artworks looted by Nazi leaders. Among Göring’s collection, they discovered “Christ and the Adulteress” and traced its sale back to Van Meegeren. The charge was collaboration with the enemy—specifically, selling Dutch cultural heritage to the Nazi occupiers. Under Dutch law, collaboration carried the death penalty.

Van Meegeren was arrested in May 1945 and imprisoned while investigators built their case. The evidence appeared damning: records documented Van Meegeren receiving payment for a national treasure that ended up in Göring’s collection. The accused faced execution unless he could prove the painting was not, in fact, Dutch cultural property. Van Meegeren’s only defense was the truth—but the truth seemed impossible to believe.

The Trial That Shocked a Nation

Shortly after his arrest, Van Meegeren made an extraordinary confession: “Christ and the Adulteress” was not a Vermeer at all, but his own creation. He had not sold Dutch cultural heritage to the Nazis—he had swindled them with a fake. Far from collaborating with the enemy, Van Meegeren claimed he was a patriot who had defrauded Hermann Göring of 137 genuine paintings in exchange for a worthless modern forgery. The accusation of collaboration should be replaced with admiration.

Authorities were skeptical. The painting had been authenticated by experts; claiming forgery seemed like a desperate lie to escape execution. To prove his claims, Van Meegeren offered to paint another Vermeer under court supervision. Over six weeks in 1945, while police watched, Van Meegeren created “Jesus Among the Doctors”—demonstrating the same techniques, the same style, and the same uncanny ability to produce works that appeared centuries old. The demonstration was convincing, but scientific verification was still required.

Dr. Paul Coremans of the Royal Institute for the Study and Conservation of Belgium’s Artistic Heritage led the forensic examination. His team analyzed the paint composition of Van Meegeren’s supposed Vermeers and discovered phenol formaldehyde resins—Bakelite and Albertol—substances not invented until the twentieth century. A bottle of phenol formaldehyde was found in Van Meegeren’s studio. The chemical evidence proved definitively that the paintings could not be genuine seventeenth-century works. Van Meegeren had told the truth.

The trial of Han van Meegeren began on October 29, 1947, in Room 4 of the Regional Court in Amsterdam. The collaboration charges had been dropped—the “Vermeer” sold to Göring was indeed a forgery and therefore not Dutch cultural property. Van Meegeren faced only charges of fraud and obtaining money under false pretenses. The trial became a media sensation, with the Dutch public following every detail of the forger’s extraordinary story.

“The man who had cheated Göring was a folk hero. It did not matter that he had also cheated Dutch collectors and museums—the image of the master Nazi being duped by a clever Dutchman delighted a nation emerging from occupation.”

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National Hero and Final Days

The trial’s verdict was almost anticlimactic. Van Meegeren was convicted of forgery and fraud on November 12, 1947, and sentenced to one year in prison—the minimum possible term. Dutch public opinion had transformed him from suspected Nazi collaborator into national hero. The man who had swindled Hermann Göring with a fake painting represented Dutch cunning triumphing over German aggression. Polls conducted during the trial showed Van Meegeren among the most popular figures in the Netherlands.

Van Meegeren never served his sentence. His health had deteriorated throughout the trial, weakened by decades of morphine addiction and the stresses of imprisonment and public exposure. On December 30, 1947—less than two months after his conviction—Van Meegeren died of heart failure at the Valerius Clinic in Amsterdam. He was fifty-eight years old. The master forger who had fooled the world’s greatest experts escaped both prison and further examination of his extraordinary career.

Van Meegeren’s known forgeries number fourteen—nine sold before World War II and five during the occupation. Experts estimate that his fraud netted the equivalent of over $30 million in contemporary currency, with victims including not only Göring but the Dutch government itself, which had contributed to the purchase of “Supper at Emmaus.” Several supposed Vermeers that Van Meegeren did not confess to creating remain subjects of debate; some art historians suspect additional forgeries may still hang in museums, their true authorship undetected.

Legacy and Continuing Fascination

Van Meegeren’s story raises profound questions about art, authenticity, and expertise. If “Supper at Emmaus” was worthy of acclaim when attributed to Vermeer, why does it become worthless when attributed to Van Meegeren? The physical object remains identical—only our knowledge of its origin has changed. Van Meegeren’s forgeries expose the degree to which art appreciation depends on context, provenance, and authority rather than pure aesthetic response.

Modern forensic techniques have rendered Van Meegeren’s methods detectable. The presence of Bakelite in paint can be identified through instrumental analysis, and radiocarbon dating can determine when materials were created. No contemporary forger could use Van Meegeren’s specific techniques successfully. Yet his story remains a cautionary tale for the art world, demonstrating how expert consensus can be manipulated by skilled deception and how desire to believe can overcome critical judgment.

Today, Van Meegeren’s forgeries are collected in their own right—not as Vermeers, but as the work of history’s most successful forger. Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen still displays “Supper at Emmaus,” now properly attributed, as a testament to one of art history’s most remarkable episodes of deception. The Rijksmuseum has acquired Van Meegeren forgeries for its collection, recognizing their significance as cultural artifacts. Van Meegeren achieved a kind of immortality after all—not as the great painter he wished to be, but as the great deceiver he became. Those interested in the artists he forged can explore Johannes Vermeer and Pieter de Hooch, both masters of the Dutch Golden Age interior scene.

Where to See Van Meegeren’s Work

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Learn more about Van Meegeren’s forgeries at Essential Vermeer or visit Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen