Church Volunteer Walks In and Finds Two Identical Paintings: The Farwell Forgery

Church Volunteer Walks In and Finds Two Identical Paintings: The Farwell Forgery A chill of controlled danger: a volunteer spots two identical paintings of the same field, barn, and woman in yellow-one hanging in the corridor and one three feet away on a drying rack-and the museum’s insured work is worth $240,000. How did an obscure Ohio regionalist’s oil on panel get swapped with a near-perfect forgery that even reproduced a warped corner and an underdrawing? Who engineered the switch and why did the X-ray files never get compared? In this episode, you’ll hear a sequence of events from the morning Scott Collins walked into the conservation anteroom to the reconstructed timeline of a deliberate swap. The episode covers the discovery, the conservator and volunteer roles, the technical forgery details, and the file manipulation that fooled the museum-could a routine appraisal hide a theft? Person: Scott Collins Person: Helen Park Person: Diane Jensen Date: June 11, 2017 Event: File swap on March 4, 2013 - The painting was appraised in 2013 with an insurance value of $240,000. - The original artist, Walter Ash, died in 1961 and was active in the 1930s-1940s. - Diane Jensen worked at Renner Diagnostic Services as a radiograph technician from 2006 through 2015. - Jensen clamped a dampened panel for eleven days to recreate a lower-left warp from humidity variation. - The Renner X-ray file of the genuine painting sat untouched in their system for four years. To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com. © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved. This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: [email protected].