The story of this amazing man, who created ingenious forgeries for the love of art, began in 1876 in the Italian city of Cremona. It's funny, but the outstanding violin makers Amati and Stradivari were born there. Dossena also tried to make violins, but he did not work out with musical instruments. Therefore, the young man got a job as a mason and sculpted tombstones until the age of 37.
To break out of the grip of poverty, Dossena left his hometown and went to Rome. But a year later, the First World War began, and Alcheo was called up to the front. He served in the airfield service staff and in his free time he made crafts. Once he made a small ceramic relief in the Renaissance style depicting the Madonna and the Holy Child, which he burned in a soldier's stove and polished. And before Christmas 1916, having gone on a short vacation, he took it with him, hoping to sell it.
In Rome, Dossena offered his relief to an innkeeper, who brought it together with a familiar antiquarian Alfredo Fasoli. To add value, Alcheo did not admit that he was the author of the relief, but said that he had found it in a destroyed church. Fasoli was satisfied with this explanation and, without much questioning, paid a hundred lire for the thing. Not bad money at the time. And they made Alceo in awe.
Demobilized in 1919 and returning to Rome, Dossena tracked down an antique dealer, reminded him of their previous meeting and said that he had some more things made of stone found in the ruined temple. However, Alfredo quickly realized that they were trying to cheat him, but did not turn to the law enforcement officers. He realized that before him was a chance to get fabulously rich. So he enlisted the help of his colleague Palési, who was well versed in sculpture, and offered Alcheo a deal. The work was in full swing.
In a workshop on the outskirts of Rome, Dossena created sculptures in the style of ancient masters and artificially aged them. And Fasoli and Palezi were involved in promoting his work in the antique market. And they did it very successfully. For the first statue made by Dossena, they paid him 200 lire, and sold him fifteen times more.
At first, forgeries were presented as works of unknown masters, and then as works of famous sculptors. Dossena's works that passed through the hands of Fasoli and Palaisey began to decorate the halls of famous museums.
So, in the New York Metropolitan Museum there was a sculpture allegedly made by a Greek master of the 6th century BC; in the Museum of San Louis - Etruscan Diana, in Cleveland - archaic Athena, in Vienna - a pediment group from Veli. And the world's leading experts confirmed their historical value and age.
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The most interesting thing is that the master himself barely made ends meet, working out of love for art. Fasoli and Palaisey kept him in a black body. It all ended tragically. In 1927, Dossena's wife, Maria, died. And the master, who creates sculptures at a price almost worth its weight in gold, did not have the money to bury his wife. Alcheo went to Fasoli and asked him for a deposit for future work. The antiquary not only did not give the money, but in harsh terms put the applicant out the door.
Therefore, the 51-year-old sculptor went to journalists who were extremely interested in his story. They immediately dubbed Alcheo the genius of forgeries and began to unearth which collections his works were in. The scandal spread to the whole world.
The authoritative American antiquarian Jacob Hirsch decided to resolve it, who purchased the statue of Athena from Fasoli for the Cleveland Museum. To prove that the archaic Athena came out from under his chisel, Dossen brought Hirsch to his workshop, described to him in detail the process of creating the sculpture and presented the marble hand of the goddess, which he himself had beaten off from the statue.
When the falsification of historical values was established, the Dossena sculpture case went to court. Alcheo was acquitted by the court. But the servants of Themis did not see any fraud on the part of Fasoli and Palezi. The age of the sculptures was determined not by them, but by museum experts.
Dossena was now selling sculptures under his own name. In the wake of the scandal, exhibitions of Alcheo's works were organized in Naples, Berlin, Munich, Cologne. But replicas with his stigma were not in great demand. He sold the entire collection for only 9 thousand dollars, whereas before one sculpture went for 150 thousand.
And in 1937 Dossena died in his workshop in Rome. A beggar and useless.