Fake or Fortune? (сериал 2011)

Fiona and Philip visit a church in Port Glasgow to investigate whether a mysterious work depicting Christ after the crucifixion could be a lost masterpiece by one of the great painters of Northern Renaissance art.

Art historian Ian Macdonald thought there was something special about the painting, but he died in 2021. Now his widow Marjorie is taking up the case with the aid of the Fake or Fortune? team. Can they find the answers Ian was looking for?

Armed with a file of research and a list of seven suspects, they follow this ecclesiastical whodunnit from Scotland to Belgium, into the beguiling world of Flemish art that was once the most accomplished, and prolific, in Europe. In one of their toughest investigations yet, the team discover why it’s so difficult to identify the artists behind Flemish masterpieces, and they use dendrochronology - the science of dating wood - to try to find out when the picture was painted.

Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould investigate a charming little landscape of a French village with a river running through it, purported to be by one of the founding members of the 19th-century impressionist movement, the British artist Alfred Sisley.

Its owners, Americans Kim and Chuck, bought the work at auction near Chicago and believe it to be genuine. However, the painting was turned down nearly ten years ago by the authentication committee, so the team will have to find new evidence to help persuade them to change their mind. A lot is at stake: if the work is genuine, it could be worth over £250,000.

Henrietta Sitwell inherited a sketch of a mother and child she believed to be by the 20th-century artist Amedeo Modigliani, but she has also been told it might not be genuine. Can the team find some answers?

Could a curious wall painting discovered in the bedroom of a Surrey cottage be the work of one of the pioneers of modern British art, Ben Nicholson? If it is, can it be safely removed from the cottage before an extension is built?

Anglesey farmer Huw Lewis bought a small painting depicting the Last Supper for £50 on the internet. After some online research, he thought it may have been painted by 18th-century artist Benjamin West, whose biggest fan was King George III. Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould set out to investigate, but soon discover the picture is in a worrying condition - and with the challenge of doing research in the middle of lock down, the odds are stacked against them.

Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould investigate a painting that depicts the terrible aftermath of a battle. Owned by Kathy and Barry Romeril, who bought it in 1987, there are suspicions it may be a work by Victorian artist Edwin Landseer that was previously thought to have been destroyed by a flood in 1928. If so, the painting could be worth as much as £80,000.

Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould investigate a small oil painting of a man praying in a mosque, a scene filled with meticulously painted and intriguing detail. Its owner, Jon Swihart, bought it at auction in 1999 and believed it to be the work of the 19th-century French artist Jean-Leon Gerome, who was a leading figure in the Orientalist genre of painting. When Jon bought the picture, it was listed as 'Circle of Gerome', having been downgraded by the leading authority on the artist at that time, Professor Gerald Ackerman. Previously, however, it had been fully attributed ...

Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould investigate more potentially valuable works of art. They begin with a sculpture found in the long grass of a Norfolk home that bears striking similarities to the work of Henry Moore. The owners are sending the piece off to the Henry Moore Foundation, so Fiona and Philip are helping them compile a dossier of evidence. If it really is a lost work by one of the greatest 20th-century artists, then it could be worth up to £1million.

The team investigates a beautiful 18th-century Venetian view. Could this be a work by one of the Italian masters, either Francesco Guardi or Michele Marieschi?

Bought for just £1, could a small still life be the work of one of the masters of early 20th-century art, Giorgio de Chirico?

Can the team prove that a portrait attributed to pioneering female artist Maria Cosway is actually an undiscovered work of the great Regency artist Sir Thomas Lawrence?

The team investigate an 18th-century landscape that could be a lost work by of one of the biggest names in British art, Thomas Gainsborough.

Twentieth-century sculptures are hot property in the art market, with Giacometti's Pointing Man figure selling for $141m at auction in New York in 2015, making it the most expensive sculpture ever sold. Could a stark, white square of plaster that has been passed down through an English family with art world connections be one of Giacometti's earliest and most daring works?

The quest to discover the history of the sculpture, known as The Gazing Head, leads the team to the bohemian world of 1930s Paris, where artists and intellectuals rubbed shoulders in cafes and studios. Can the team find any proof that the owner's grandmother acquired the sculpture from Giacometti during the time she spent studying and modelling in the city? If it's genuine, the sculpture could be worth hundreds of thousands of pounds, but there's a problem - it was once knocked over by a cat and broken into several pieces. The team hope that a high-tech CT scan might reveal more about the damage it has sustained during its life and even yield clues about its origins.

The trouble is, proving the authenticity of sculptures is notoriously difficult as works are often produced in multiple editions - and can be easy to replicate. As the investigation unfolds, the team travels to Germany to find out how police broke up a forgery ring that churned out thousands of fake Giacometti pieces. The final decision lies with the Giacometti Committee in Paris - and this could be one of the most complex cases they've ever considered.

Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould investigate two rare portraits of black British subjects from the 18th and 19th centuries. Painted with extraordinary skill and sophistication, both pictures are highly unusual in their positive depiction of black sitters at a time when Britain was still heavily engaged in slavery. But this is also an intriguing double whodunnit. Who are the artists who broke with the conventions of the time to paint these exceptional works?

The first case is a double portrait featuring Dido Belle, a former slave who became a member of the aristocratic Mansfield family. The painting is on display at Scone Palace in Scotland and was commissioned by the first Lord Mansfield, Dido Belle's guardian, sometime in the late 1770s or early 1780s at the height of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. In recent years, Belle's incredible story has inspired books and a feature film about her life. Now the current Lady Mansfield is determined to discover the name of the artist who painted her.

The second painting is even more unusual - two beautifully dressed black girls holding a book in what appears to be a tropical landscape. Early clues suggest this could be a political painting somehow connected to the campaign to abolish slavery in Britain's colonies. Could the sitters themselves be slaves, but if so why are they wearing such fine clothes?

The quest to solve both mysteries throws up some prime suspects from a golden era of British portraiture. But is new forensic and documentary evidence enough to convince a sceptical art world?

The team investigate whether a small watercolour sketch could be by the British 20th-century sculptor Henry Moore. It is the only piece thought to be that of a British artist in a Nazi hoard of around 1,500 works discovered in Germany in 2012. Known as the Gurlitt hoard, it is now housed in the Museum of Fine Art in Bern, Switzerland. Every piece in the hoard has to be researched, as if it was art stolen or looted from Jewish families, it should be returned.

Fiona and Philip need to establish two things - firstly whether this a genuine work by Henry Moore or a whether it is a fake, And secondly, if it is genuine, how did a sketch by a British artist end up in a Nazi art hoard? The answer to this will decide its fate.

The film goes on a journey from prewar Britain, where the little-known Henry Moore was beginning to make waves as a daring and progressive sculptor, to Germany in the 1930s. In England Philip meets Henry Moore's only child Mary, hoping that she will offer some insights into the way her father worked, and he asks if she can see her father's hand in the sketch. He compares the sketch to other genuine works by Moore from the time and subjects it to forensic tests. Will this reveal the smoking gun that would firmly put the name Henry Moore to this small drawing?

In Germany, Fiona is on the provenance trail. She discovers that in the early 1930s, Hildebrand Gurlitt, the man who amassed this valuable hoard, was a forward-looking museum curator who encouraged the avant garde artists like Henry Moore. But this wasn't to last. In 1933 Hitler consolidated his power in Germany and set out to purge the country of any modern progressive art - or what the Nazi called degenerate art. Hildebrand Gurlitt lost his job but in an extraordinary transformation used his knowledge of the art Hitler hated to become one of four dealers allowed to sell degenerate art on the international market to make money for the Nazi regime. Could the sketch have been one that Hitler wanted to supress? And if so, how and when did Hildebrand Gurlitt get his hands on it? Fiona follows the trail to Berlin and to the Schonhausen Palace, where a lot of the so-called degenerate art was stored and viewed by the chosen few dealers. Could this have been where Hildebrand Gurlitt had the opportunity to buy the Moore sketch?

Will the art investigators find enough evidence to convince the Henry Moore Review Panel that this is a genuine early work by Henry Moore? Will the outcome of the provenance search show that it was legitimately bought by Hildebrand Gurlitt and so can rightfully stay in the museum in Bern?

Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould head to France to take on a testing challenge - can they reverse an art world decision which one owner refuses to accept?

Two sketchbooks found in a garden shed in St Emilion were given to a teenage boy, Alain, by his grandmother back in 1965. Although she never revealed where they came from, they were thought to be the work of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, the aristocratic artist born in 1864 known for his atmospheric depictions of Parisian nightlife.

Alain waited 50 years before he decided to present the sketches to the French committee responsible for authenticating the work of Toulouse-Lautrec. Unfortunately, the committee did not accept them as the work of Toulouse-Lautrec and stated they were the work of another artist - Rene Princeteau - meaning they are worth just a few thousand pounds instead of many hundreds of thousands.

For Fiona and Philip, this is on one of their toughest investigations - if they are to prove the sketches are by Toulouse-Lautrec, they must not only discredit them as the work of Rene Princeteau but also persuade a respected committee to change their mind.

The sketchbooks are brimming with drawings - beautiful and characterful images of women, horses, sailors, soldiers and dogs. If they are the work of Toulouse-Lautrec, they are not the kind of images for which is he best known. Some of the pages are dated 1880, which would mean they are the work of the teenage Toulouse-Lautrec, and little is known about this period of his work.

In their quest, the team journey to the beautiful town of Albi in southern France, where Toulouse-Lautrec was born, and visit the grand family home, Chateau du Bosc, where the artist spent much of his youth. With so little evidence to go on, Fiona and Philip scour the rooms for clues that might link the life of Toulouse-Lautrec to drawings in Alain's sketchbooks.

Technical analysis is also vital, but Fiona and Philip are still piecing together their scientific evidence when the Toulouse-Lautrec committee announces that it's meeting - soon. It's a deadline they can't miss, but can they put together a compelling case in time?

Can the team prove that a beautiful still life of a glass jug and pears is the work of celebrated British artist William Nicholson?

The investigation began when viewer Lyn got in touch to ask for our help - a painting she owns recently suffered a fatal blow when it was rejected by the leading authority on William Nicholson and was left out of the artist's latest catalogue raisonnee - the official list of all his known works. Lyn bought the paining in 2006 for £165,000, believing it to be a genuine Nicholson, but now it's worth practically nothing. However, this damning ruling has divided art world opinion. Can Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould uncover enough new evidence to convince sceptics that this is a genuine Nicholson?

William Nicholson was one of the leading British artists of his generation. Born in 1872, he began his career as a graphic artist before forging success as a painter. Over five decades he created nearly 900 oil paintings from informal portraits to haunting landscapes, but it's his exquisite still lifes which are most admired. In the years after his death, William Nicholson was overshadowed by his more famous son, the abstract artist Ben Nicholson, but today his work is highly prized, often reaching six-figure sums. This programme has a highly personal element - Lyn grew to love Nicholson through her aunt, Lillian Browse, who was a legend in the art world and one of the first female art dealers. It was just a few months after her aunt's death that Lyn bought the picture from her gallery. Lillian Browse was renowned for her knowledge of William Nicholson, having published the first catalogue raisonnee in 1956.

For Lyn, this is as much about justice for her aunt - would she really have had a fake Nicholson in her gallery? - as a fight for the painting she loves and the money she's lost. Fiona and Philip build up a detailed forensic case, starting with a lucky find - Nicholson's very own paintbox, kept in William Nicholson's grandson's house. It's a gift for scientific analysis, but will paint samples from the painting match those from Nicholson's own paintbox? The back of the painting reveals more clues with handwriting that can be compared to letters written by Nicholson, and an x-ray shows there's more to this painting than first meets the eye.

As the team delve back into the provenance of the painting, they come across an alarming find - could this painting have been involved in one of the great art crimes of the 20th century? Fiona meets reformed art forger John Myatt to find out if he ever faked a Nicholson. In a final bid to put the name Nicholson to this painting, Philip travels to Canada, where he compares the painting to a very similar Nicholson painting of a glass jug and pears. Could this painting hold the key to authenticating Lyn's? A compelling forensic case is pieced together, but is it enough? Will Lyn get justice for her painting?

The team are on the trail of two pictures brought to their attention by viewers, both believed to be by Paul Gauguin - one of the giants of 19th-century art. Could two lost works have surfaced in Cambridgeshire and a suburb of Manchester?

Paul Gauguin is one of the most intriguing artists of late 19th-century France, a stockbroker who abandoned Paris for a bohemian life in Tahiti. He is certainly one of the most valuable - his Tahitian masterpiece When Will you Marry? sold for $200 million in 2015, making it one of the most expensive paintings ever sold.

A woman in Manchester thinks she may have inherited Gauguin's very first pencil sketch for this iconic painting. If it's genuine, this fragile relic of the artist's time in Tahiti could be worth over £200,000, but its authenticity has been called into doubt.

To raise the stakes even further, the team are on the trail of a second possible Gauguin - a still life depicting a bowl of fruit. A Cambridge-based man has spent years trying to prove that his oil painting, inherited from a family friend, is a genuine work that dates back to the crucial moment when Gauguin discovered the style which made him famous.

The team have got a battle on their hands because the authenticity of both works has been called into question by leading auction houses. The quest to find out the truth about the two pictures takes them to Bilbao, Brittany, Paris and the Imperial War Museum as they delve into the story of the sketch owner's grandfather, a German art historian who fled the Nazis for a new life in England. But as the investigation progresses, they stumble across a forgery scandal that is only beginning to come to light.

The team embark on a long-distance investigation to Australia as they try to prove that an online purchase from an English auction site is a lost work by Tom Roberts, considered one of Australia's greatest artists.

When Australian couple Joe and Rosanna Natoli came across a painting bearing the signature Tom Roberts on the website of an English auction site, they couldn't quite believe it. Roberts is considered one of Australia's most important artists - a pioneer of Australian Impressionism whose works hangs in major galleries. Even minor pictures sell for hundreds of thousands of pounds and the painting, a dramatic image of an anguished artist titled Rejected, had all the hallmarks of a lost early work. After a fierce bidding war, Joe bought the painting, shipped it back to Brisbane and presented it to a leading expert on the artist's work - only to be told that it was not genuine.

This was just the beginning of Joe and Rosanna's troubles. Three years after they bought the painting, Joe's business went bankrupt and the family lost their home. Joe still firmly believes that his original hunch was right, and he has asked Fake or Fortune for help. As an early work by Tom Roberts, the picture could be worth over £200,000. If the team can prove that Joe was right all along, it might give the family a chance to secure a home of their own.

The team believes some of the answers to the mystery lie in Tom Roberts's time in England, where he trained at the Royal Academy in the 1880s. The quest for further proof takes them to Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, where they encounter several alarming fakes. Can the team find enough evidence to earn the painting a second hearing?

The team try to find out whether a beautiful English landscape is a work of national importance - a lost masterpiece by John Constable and quite possibly an alternative view of his greatest work, The Hay Wain. Now owned by a British businessman, the painting appears to have all the hallmarks of Constable's sketches - his more impressionistic, preparatory works. If genuine, it could be worth at least £2 million.

There are few more iconic paintings in British art than Constable's The Hay Wain. A picture with a direct link to this milestone in British art would be the holy grail for any collector or museum and the picture appears to depict the very same scene, Willy Lott's cottage on the banks of the River Stour.

The trouble is, Constable is one of the most faked artists of the 19th century, and the painting has a chequered past. Thirty years ago, several top Constable experts decided that it was not an authentic work. It is a particularly personal case for Philip Mould, who briefly owned the painting in the past but had to let it slip through his fingers after he failed in his attempts to prove its authenticity.

Now scientific analysis techniques have moved on and neglected records can be searched more deeply online, can the latest advances and deep research into the picture's provenance turn up enough evidence to prove that it is a genuine work by John Constable?

Every year, the Fake or Fortune team receive hundreds of requests for help from the owners of mysterious portraits. Everyone wants to know two things - who is it, and who painted it?

The team choose three of the most promising portraits to investigate further - a child, believed to be by prized modern artist Willem de Kooning, a young lady, attributed to 18th-century society painter Philip Mercier, and a formidable-looking man, said to be by 19th-century German master Adolph von Menzel.

Philip Mould takes on the de Kooning case, meeting Belgian owners Jan and Chris Starckx. Could a speculative online purchase for 450 euros be a lost work painted by de Kooning in Brussels at the very start of his career? The quest to prove it leads to Miami, Florida, where scientific analysis of a similar work has the potential to yield vital evidence.

Fiona Bruce wants to know how an 18th-century portrait of a lady ended up in the flat of Richard and Jenny Williams, a retired couple in Eastbourne. Conservation work might help reveal some secrets while research into the life of the artist provides some clues about the identity of the mystery lady.

The investigation into the portrait of The Old Gentleman takes an unexpected turn when the team delve into the story of owner Lance Miller's grandfather, a German industrialist who bought the painting in 1947. With Menzel's work frequently targeted by forgers, has Lance inherited a rare treasure - or something more sinister?

Three pictures, three important artists - but as scientific testing and investigative research unlock long-held secrets, will every story have a happy ending?

An enchanting sketch of a dancer believed to have been drawn by Auguste Rodin is at the centre of an investigation that draws the team into a recent forgery scandal that has rocked the French art establishment.

Alice Thoday, a Lincolnshire resident with Belgian roots, inherited the rare watercolour from her mother and has always believed it to be part of a series of works Rodin drew of a Cambodian dance troupe which visited France in 1906. It could be worth over £100,000 if genuine - but the trouble is, Rodin is one of the world's most faked artists.

The quest to prove it is the genuine article takes the team to Paris and the Musee Rodin, where they search for stylistic similarities in genuine works. The provenance trail leads to Mexico City in the 1940s, where Alice's mother was given the painting by a businessman called Jimmy Heineman. Who was he and how did he get his hands on a rare Rodin sketch?

The deeper the team digs, the more worrying the evidence is about the extent to which Rodin's work has been faked by notorious forgers such as Ernst Durig, a Swiss-born sculptor who claimed to be Rodin's last pupil.

The team turns to scientific analysis and a handwriting expert in a bid to get to the truth. Will the world's foremost expert believe the picture is a missing sketch by Rodin himself, or a very clever fake?

The Fake or Fortune team have been called in to investigate a mysterious painting in Castle of Park, a grand house in Aberdeenshire now run as a bed and breakfast by Becky Wilson.

The painting once belonged to Becky's late husband Neil, an art dealer, and although it was unsigned he always believed it was something special - a lost masterpiece by celebrated 19th-century French artist Paul Delaroche, whose work graces some of Britain's finest collections.

A bargain at just £500, Neil had tried to convince experts that the exquisitely detailed painting of a royal lady and her attendants was an important missing work and was about to conduct further research when he was diagnosed with a brain tumour. He passed away in 2014.

Becky contacted the Fake or Fortune team to say she and her children would love to know if Neil was right about the painting he passionately believed was genuine. If it is by Delaroche, then it is worth an estimated £50,000.

The team set out to finish the work Neil started. The stakes are raised when evidence in the British Museum suggests Neil's painting might be a lost royal treasure which was once owned by the last King and Queen of the French, Louis Philippe and Marie Amelie.

The search for clues leads Fiona to the glorious Chateau d'Eu in Normandy on the trail of a stained-glass window created in the image of Delaroche's lost painting for the queen's private chapel.

Yet the deeper the team dig, the more they discover about a growing number of copies of the same image. Concerns about the condition of Becky's painting prompt Philip to carry out detailed scientific research into the pigments the artist used, while Fiona tries to find out if the painting could have made its way to England with Queen Marie Amelie when she fled France during the 1848 revolution.

Have the team been dealing with a clever copy, or was Neil Wilson's hunch correct, and a long-lost masterpiece has finally been rediscovered?

Fake or Fortune returns for a fifth series, beginning with one of the most challenging cases the team has ever encountered. Can art detectives Philip Mould and Fiona Bruce prove that a painting of a man in a black cravat is one of the first pictures ever painted by celebrated and controversial British artist Lucian Freud, even though Freud himself denied painting it?

London-based designer Jon Turner is eager to prove that a painting he inherited from two friends is in fact an early portrait painted by Freud whilst at art school in 1939. If it's genuine, it could be worth around half a million pounds. But who is the mysterious man in the portrait - and why did Freud deny it was his work?

As the team hunt for clues, they are drawn into a world of feuds, rivalries and intrigue. Can those who knew Freud best help unlock the painting's secrets?

Charles Henty, the man in charge of the Old Bailey, has a problem - the death of his uncle has left him with a working farm to run in France and a crippling inheritance tax bill to pay. He is desperate to protect the jobs of the farmworkers and keep the farm running in his uncle's memory, but the only way he can do that is by selling two paintings he owns - if he can prove they're genuine.

One, believed to be by Sir Winston Churchill, was discovered in the coalhole of Charles' family home in London in the 60s. It's a picturesque scene of a medieval village in the south of France. But which village? For the painting to be accepted as genuine, the Fake or Fortune team must first find the exact location and then prove that Churchill painted the scene. There's a lot at stake, with a Churchill painting selling at Sotheby's in 2014 for £1.8 million, but a leading expert has grave misgivings about the authenticity of the picture.

Charles' other painting is a landscape of Dedham in Essex, believed to be by Sir Alfred Munnings, best known for his paintings of horses and once the most expensive British artist of his day. However, Dedham was also the home of Tom Keating, Britain's most notorious forger of the 20th century. Presenter Philip Mould is drawn into the murky world of fakes and forgeries, where nothing is quite as it seems.

The Fake or Fortune team pull out all the stops in this dramatic and emotionally charged investigation, but can they prove that both pictures are genuine?

A beautiful church in the heart of the Lancastrian countryside has for over 200 years been home to a possible 16th-century Italian Old Master. But it is also at the centre of an unusual mystery. The congregation have contacted Fake or Fortune? to help solve a riddle which has been puzzling everyone. Who painted this huge picture, and just how did it find its way into a church once patronised by the famous Bronte sisters?

Philip is immediately struck by the imposing painting, which depicts one of the most dramatic scenes from the New Testament, the aftermath of the crucifixion of Christ. He has a hunch it might date from the Italian Renaissance, which would make it the oldest picture ever investigated on Fake or Fortune?

But to prove his theory will require a series of scientific tests to look beneath the layers of dirt and grime to see if any clues to the artist's identity can be revealed.

The trail leads Fiona and Philip on a surprising and colourful journey to Italy, where Philip wants to inspect pictures by the great Old Masters Titian and Tintoretto. Fiona uncovers a secret history of stolen paintings and meets an Italian scholar who may have a significant lead in the case.

Back in the UK, Bendor is looking into a local aristocrat who the congregation believe donated the painting and discovers some family secrets which may shed new light on how the painting arrived in the church over two centuries ago.

But the British art market will take some convincing that an artist can be officially attributed to the picture, and this will require a hugely ambitious restoration project. By fully cleaning the picture, can Fake or Fortune? prove beyond doubt the identity of the painter?

Nicky Philipps, a portrait artist renowned for her pictures of the royal family, has asked the Fake or Fortune team to investigate a painting which hangs on the walls of Picton Castle, once the Philipps family seat. The work was bought in the 1930s by Nicky's great-grandfather, Sir Laurence Philipps, who believed it to be by celebrated impressionist Pierre-Auguste Renoir. But the painting has been dogged by doubt for half a century, and two art world authorities can't agree whether it's genuine or fake.

Nicky's late Aunt Gwen used to tell a tantalising story that the painting came from Claude Monet's house in Giverny and was a gift to the artist from Renoir at a time when they painted together. But a family anecdote isn't enough to convince the art world's toughest judges - the team must find hard evidence.

The trail takes Philip to Argenteuil, a suburb of Paris which was once an impressionist playground. During the 1870s, Renoir and Monet worked here together, often painting the same views side by side. But can Philip find any evidence that Nicky's picture was painted here?

Fiona picks up the provenance trail at Monet's house in Giverny, where she tries to find proof that the painting once hung in his personal art collection. To find out, she must access some closely guarded archives in Paris.

Philip travels to Berlin to see if cutting-edge technology can determine whether the pigments in Nicky's painting match up to those listed by Renoir himself. Can a special camera see through the canvas to reveal clues hidden from view?

Along the way, Fiona discovers that the picture is caught between two rival art world authorities - the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery and the Wildenstein Institute, who both believe their word is the last word when it comes to Renoir.

Art detectives Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould return for a brand new series, starting with an investigation into three small pictures by one of Britain's best-loved modern artists - LS Lowry.

Stephen Ames, a Cheshire property developer, has a problem - he's inherited three small oil paintings believed to be by Laurence Stephen Lowry, an artist renowned for his scenes of northern life, but he doesn't have any proof. All he knows is that they were bought by his father Gerald, a self-made businessman with a passion for art, in the early 70s.

The trouble for Stephen is that LS Lowry is probably the most faked British artist, his deceptively simple style of painting making him a soft target for forgers. As a result, the art market has become very wary of newly discovered Lowry works. If he can't find evidence in favour of the pictures, they are worthless.

As they hunt for proof with the assistance of specialist art researcher Dr Bendor Grosvenor, the team encounter unexpected obstacles and extraordinary coincidences, culminating in a groundbreaking scientific discovery that challenges everything we thought we knew about Lowry the artist. But is it enough to prove that the pictures are genuine?

The team face a daunting challenge as they search for lost masterpieces in Britain's public art collections. To focus their research they look to the Your Paintings online records, where many thousands of oil paintings are listed - 17,000 of them recorded as 'artist unknown'. From these Philip and Bendor believe they have identified several important yet previously unidentified works by Thomas Gainsborough - but can they prove it?

A handsome portrait of Joseph Gape, mayor of St Albans in the 18th century, languishes in a backroom of the city's museum. The identity of the artist who painted it is unknown - but Bendor thinks it is a Gainsborough that dates back to his days as Britain's foremost high society portrait painter. The team thinks there are telling signs in the way the man is dressed and the unusual shape of the frame - but they'll need to convince the world's leading Gainsborough expert.

An even tougher challenge is posed by Imaginary Landscape, held in London's Courtauld Institute. Philip thinks it is also an important lost work - a rare, late Gainsborough landscape, painted when the artist was experimenting with dreamlike scenes. But would Gainsborough really have executed it on paper rather than canvas, and why is conservationist Aviva Burnstock troubled by a distinctive blue pigment?

Philip made his name in the art world with his Gainsborough discoveries and his reputation is on the line as decision time looms.

The Fake or Fortune team plunges into the murky world of the Russian art market when they investigate a painting attributed to modern master Marc Chagall.

In 1992, a property developer seized the chance to invest £100,000 in a work by one of the 20th century's greatest artists - Marc Chagall. The picture had surfaced in Russia after the fall of communism, and was offered at a fraction of its full value. There was just one catch - it hadn't been fully authenticated by the Chagall Committee in Paris. Twenty years later, the owner wants to find out if he made a shrewd investment - or an expensive mistake.

The search for clues leads Fiona to Chagall's hometown of Vitebsk in the former Russian republic of Belarus, where she makes connections between the painting and the artist's life story, but events take a more sinister turn when she discovers a news report about the sale of a fake Chagall in the city of Minsk.

With scientific testing raising more questions than answers, Philip travels to Los Angeles to consult a notorious forger called Tony Tetro who specialized in faking the work of Chagall. As the team grapple with the shadowy world of the modern Russian art market, everything hinges on a critical test to determine the date of a suspicious pigment as the investigation threatens to turn into a 'whodunnit'.

And when the dust settles, there is one more shocking and unexpected twist that leaves the owner with a difficult decision.

The Fake or Fortune team takes on a doubly challenging investigation as they try to prove that not one but two paintings are missing works by one of Britain's best-loved artists - John Constable.

Gillie Dance used to keep her painting of Yarmouth Jetty under the bed in her London home, never quite believing it could be by Constable - but Fiona Bruce starts to get excited when a previous owner turns out to have a close connection to the artist's family.

The other picture, A Sea Beach Brighton, used to hang in the prestigious Boston Museum of Fine Arts - until they mysteriously sold it off at a fraction of its value as a recognized Constable in the early 90s. American attorney Tom Toppin and his wife Bernie snapped it up - but they've been struggling to prove its authenticity ever since. Philip Mould has a hunch that the proof they seek lies in other Constable paintings in US galleries - but will the experts agree?

The trouble for the team is that Constable is one of Britain's most widely faked artists and there are surprises in store when paint analysis suggests one picture has a murky past, while an x-ray provokes screams from Fiona and owner Gillie when it reveals one of the biggest shocks of the series.

Scriptwriter Keith Tutt fell in love with the work of French post-Impressionist painter Edouard Vuillard in his school art class. When a large oval picture of a Parisian café scene said to be by the artist appeared in a provincial auction house, he gambled his savings on it - even though it doesn't appear in the official record of Vuillard's works. To prove it, the team will need to convince some of the most demanding art experts in France... and they've got a tricky history with Fake or Fortune.

The quest for evidence starts in Geneva, where Philip and conservationist Aviva Burnstock compare Keith's picture with a huge Vuillard work called Le Grand Teddy, painted for a French café in 1919. Can science prove that the two pictures were painted using identical materials?

Fiona picks up the provenance trail in France and Holland, unearthing tantalising clues about the picture's past, while a meeting with a pair of British antiques hunters dramatically expands the scope of the investigation. Could there really be another missing oval?

Once the team has marshalled all their evidence, it's time to seek the approval of the Wildenstein Institute in Paris, the body who notoriously rejected a highly credible Monet in the first ever episode of Fake or Fortune. Have the team done enough to convince them that Keith's picture is genuine?

Art detective Philip Mould has a reputation for finding sleepers - paintings that hide dark secrets. His most remarkable finds are pictures whose true authorship has been confused, masterpieces lost beneath years of dirt and over-painting. Although Philip is used to investigating other people's paintings, this time the tables are turned as Philip's own purchase is put under the microscope.

With his keen-eyed researcher Bendor Grosvenor, Philip has bought a painting that he says could be the find of a lifetime - a work by portrait painter Sir Anthony Van Dyck, one which is worth a small fortune. The only problem is that, in order to prove it, he will have to remove later layers of paint to uncover the truth. "It's a bit like open heart surgery," says Philip, as the expensive and irreversible process begins.

A thorough restoration is needed, and inches of canvas are cut away as an earlier image begins to appear. Fiona is not convinced, and insists that the work undergoes a thorough investigation and is authenticated by an independent Van Dyck expert. Will Philip's reputation and the painting make it to the end of the journey unscathed?

In the early years of the 20th century, spinster sisters Gwendoline and Margaret Davies spent much of their vast fortune buying the cream of European art as a gift to the people of Wales. When Gwendoline died in 1951, all the paintings in her collection were bequeathed to the National Museum of Wales. Amongst the works most proudly displayed were many by JMW Turner, perhaps the nation's best loved artist. These paintings were the pinnacle of the sisters' collection, carefully selected and greatly valued.

Yet within months of this extraordinary act of generosity, the authenticity of the paintings was thrown into doubt by art world experts who branded them fakes. These prized exhibits were deemed 'unfit to hang on the gallery's walls'. For more than half a century a cloud has hung over three of the landscapes, said by experts to be a hand other than Turner's. But Philip believes this may be a miscarriage of justice. As Philip and Fiona investigate, they enter a murky world as they discover the paintings are connected to Turner's secret lover. In the end it will be down to the latest forensic testing in order to prove if the paintings were by Joseph Mallord William Turner. But will the process restore the Davies sisters' reputations as art connoisseurs and allow the pictures to see the light of day once again?

Inheriting a work of art by one of the great Impressionist masters should be a joy, but for Patrick Rice it was a mixed blessing. His small oil painting depicting a ballet dancer on stage has always been thought to be a work by Edgar Hilaire Degas. Unfortunately, since the 1970s, experts have not agreed. The painting, which could be worth around half-a-million pounds if it is a Degas, is currently worth £200. In a last ditch attempt to discover the truth, Patrick and his son Jonathan ask Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould to handle the case.

Although bought as a Degas from a reputable London dealer in 1945 by Patrick's father, the painting, titled Danseuse Bleue et Contrebasses, failed to make the official record of Degas, the catalogue raisonne. As far as auction houses and experts are concerned, if it's not in the catalogue then it's not by Degas, and cannot be sold as such. Fiona and Philip follow the painting back through time to try to prove that it was created by one of France's greatest painters. It is a journey that takes them to Paris, Hamburg and Berlin. Could the picture be a fake created, like many others, amidst the chaos of World War Two? Or will the scholars responsible for authentification bring Patrick and his family life-changing news?

Fiona Bruce and art expert Philip Mould team up to investigate mysteries behind paintings.

In this closing episode, suspicions are aroused when Philip and his researcher Bendor spot a rogue picture for sale in a South African auction house. It exudes all the classic scent of being a 'sleeper', an important picture that has been miscatalogued and offered for a very low price.

But there is a darker side revealed when investigations uncover that this is a wanted painting, having been stolen by the Nazis in World War II. Records show it was considered a German national treasure, once thought to have been painted by Rembrandt. A Jewish family have been trying to track it and other works stolen from their gallery ever since.

With minutes to go, Philip and Fiona manage to stop the sale and release the picture for investigation. Having picked it up from Cape Town, Fiona delivers it to Philip and an in-depth examination utilising the latest infrared and forensic testing begins. Can it really be by Rembrandt and will it be possible to see it returned to its rightful owners?

In an effort to solve who painted it, Philip travels to Amsterdam to meet a man with the power of a demigod; the chair of the Rembrandt Research Project on whose word hangs the verdict that can make the value differ by many millions of pounds.

Fiona meanwhile tries to unpick the thorny question of ownership before returning the picture to South Africa, when the owner of the disputed painting finally emerges from the shadows to tell his story.

The art world can prove a bear pit, with a myriad of tricksters at work. Experts estimate that anything between 20%-40% of works of art on the market are faked. And they can turn up in the most unexpected places.

Hanging in one of the most prestigious and respected art institutes in London is a picture Philip has heard of, which may hold the key to unlocking the story of the most audacious forger of all time. A man who dared to fake the work of Old Masters and made millions from his deception, until he was caught in 1945: Han Van Meegeren.

But a mystery remains to this day, as Van Meegeren died before a complete record of his fakes was made. How did he pull off faking Old Master paintings, duping important art galleries in to making purchases of works apparently by Vermeer, even foxing Goering in to buying one of his works during the war?

Philip and Fiona get to work on the London picture which, legend has it, hung in Van Meegeren's studio on the day he was arrested. Was it his last work? And by testing it, can we prove how he out-foxed some of the most eminent minds in the art world?

Journalist Fiona Bruce teams up with art expert Philip Mould to investigate mysteries behind paintings. It's a world of subterfuge and intrigue as they grapple with complex battles often unseen beneath the apparently genteel art establishment.

In this episode, the focus falls on a painting found dumped by a rubbish tip which turns out to be a lost work by one of America's most important 19th century artists, Winslow Homer. In a shock for all concerned, it is valued at 250,000 dollars. But who legally owns the picture, and why was it found in such an unlikely place? Philip and Fiona investigate.

Journalist Fiona Bruce teams up with art expert Philip Mould to investigate mysteries behind paintings, starting with what they believe is an unrecognised work by Monet.