At first, the tale seems rather ordinary: in 1920, Andrée and Harry Hahn offer for sale a painting, La Belle Ferronnière
, that they claim is by Leonardo da Vinci. An art dealer questions the painting's authenticity—and the couple sues. In the courtroom, the circus begins, with the usual one-upmanship of experts, cross-examinations and baffled jurors. In two other circus rings are the broader art market and the world of schemers, fakes and the truth about the painting itself. Brewer, a professor of humanities and social sciences at the California Institute of Technology, is a fine ringmaster. He paints thorough pictures of each player—the ambitious Midwesterner Harry Hahn; the rarified and aggressive art dealer Sir Joseph Duveen; and the numerous representatives who took on the challenge of selling a “tainted” painting: “A large, hectoring man who was also capable of great charm, [Leon] Loucks... told his friends that he was an illegitimate child who had been abandoned by his shame-faced mother who 'sold' him to a medical research facility....” Is La Belle Ferronnière
a Leonardo? That mystery drives the book forward, but also delivers a satisfying twist: why do we care? 12 b&w illus. (Oct.)
