On the surface, John Drewe seemed to be living the sort of life many people dream of.

He had two physics PhDs and a job as an advisor at the Atomic Energy Authority. He lived in an upmarket London neighbourhood with his family and was an admired patron of the Tate Gallery.

But Drewe had a secret. He had never studied physics. His job was a sham. And instead of working on atomic energy, he was the mastermind behind the biggest art forgery racket of the 20th century.

Fifteen years on, the art world’s bruises have yet to completely heal. And the recent news of a hitherto-unknown Caravaggio having been found gathering dust in a French attic should prompt art lovers to remember the lessons learnt from the Drewe-Myatt affair.

Sometimes, a buyer’s keenness to obtain an object means they ignore the warning signs, former West Sussex art detective Malcolm Kenwood explained in a recent lecture he gave in Malta. Having spent his career hunting down men like Drewe, Malcolm was on the island to lecture of art forgeries and fakes as part of the DFASinMalta monthly art lecture series.

In Drewe’s case, the warning signs were certainly there. Art galleries were all-too-happy to grant him access to their document libraries in exchange for grandiose donations, with Drewe then using the documents as templates for forged ones. Dealers and auction houses accepted documentation from people and organisations Drewe had conjured out of thin air.

Perhaps most damningly of all, the 200 forged Giacometti, Chagall, Matisse, Sutherland and other paintings created for Drewe by his accomplice John Myatt were technically mediocre.

So mediocre, in fact, that they were painted using Dulux emulsion paint and KY Jelly.

A born con man, Drewe’s real genius lay in recognising two key weaknesses in the way high art was bought and sold: buyers relied heavily on historical documents to prove a painting’s authenticity, while the art experts who could best judge a painting often feared making a judgment call, knowing that one wrong call could ruin their reputation.

Somewhere in the world, people are paying insurance premiums and installing security systems for a Marc Chagall they once bought, which in reality is painted using emulsion paint and KY Jelly

The con artist ruthlessly worked these angles. He forged signatures, drafted buyers’ certificates and used the names of old acquaintances who were down on their luck as fronts.

In one case, a would-be buyer was keen to find an expert to examine a purported Giacometti. One of Drewe’s middle men suggested he speak to Art Research Associates, a firm that specialised in authenticating artworks. The firm was run by a ‘Prof Drewe’, who confirmed there was “no question” the Myatt-painted fraud was a genuine Giacometti – for a hefty fee.

Artist John Myatt now runs a successful business selling 'genuine forgeries'. Photo: Washington Green Fine Art

In the end, it was trouble at home that brought the two fraudsters crashing down. When Drewe left his partner, he forgot to take all of his documents with him. Scorned and suspicious, she took the papers to the police. That led them to Myatt, who had become an increasingly unwilling accomplice over the years. When police came knocking, he folded like a deck of cards and agreed to testify against Drewe.

The pair had made more than €1 million from the scam. Of the estimated 200 forgeries that the two created, only 70-odd have been recovered. Their elaborate web of deceit, coupled perhaps with a degree of cognitive dissonance – who wants to be told that they’ve spent millions on a worthless fake? – means that many of their works may never be found.

A Modigliani painted by John Drewe’s one-time accomplice John Myatt. Source: www.johnmyatt.com

Authentication methods have come a long way since the Drewe-Myatt scandal, says Mr Kenwood. DNA and forensic technology have made art forgery harder to pull off, and dealers have grown more suspicious of sudden discoveries that come like a bolt from the blue.

When the scandal broke, its sheer scale meant the art world’s reputation lay in tatters. How could two men with a typewriter and some household paint have hoodwinked so many self-professed ‘experts’? What incentive did auction houses have to ensure provenance research was done robustly?

And if the only difference between a genuine de Staël and one painted by a fraudster was forged paperwork, was the million-dollar trade in master artworks a modern-day version of the Emperor’s new clothes?

Yet despite the setback, art prices have continued to rise as the mega-rich race to seize the social cachet owning a masterpiece bestows. Those in the know estimate that as much as 15 per cent of all art is forged or fake: it seems safe to assume that as long as those with deep pockets continue to thirst for art’s prestige rather than its intrinsic worth, the Drewes and Myatts of this world will find work.

The real-life Drewe ended up spending five years behind bars. Once released, he went on to con a 70-year-old lady out of her life savings. Myatt took a more benign path, starting a thriving business of selling ‘John Myatt genuine forgeries’ for thousands of pounds.

Myatt has said that he’ll never identify the works he painted. Which means that, somewhere in the world, people are paying insurance premiums and installing security systems for a Marc Chagall they once bought, which in reality is painted using emulsion paint and KY Jelly.

The next DFASinMalta lecture will be held on June 6 and is titled Treasure of the Silk Road: From China to the Mediterranean. For more information, find them on Facebook.