Amedeo Modigliani Scholar Disputes AI Art Authentication Firm’s Claim

On 7 May, the Swiss firm Art Recognition announced that a painting previously attributed to Amedeo Modigliani had become the first AI-authenticated artwork to be accepted into an official catalogue raisonné.

Art Recognition says it was approached last year by Lemania Law Avocats, a Geneva-based law firm representing the painting’s owners, and asked to analyse the work. The painting, titled Jeune Femme au Col de Fourrure (Young Woman with a Fur Collar, 1915), was run through Art Recognition’s AI authentication system and the results came back positive. Using Ambrogio Ceroni’s catalogue raisonné (long regarded by the art market as the benchmark reference on Modigliani) as one of its datasets, the AI assigned the painting a 78.38 percent probability of authenticity.

The company’s CEO, Carina Popovici, says it marks ‘a potential turning point in the field of art authentication’. She writes: ‘The case highlights the potential of AI as a complementary tool alongside connoisseurship, provenance research and forensic testing.’

However, the press release quickly drew the ire of Modigliani scholar Marc Restellini, the founder of the Paris-based Institut Restilini, which studies artworks using science and traditional art history. He spent three decades compiling the said catalogue raisonné, which is six-volumes deep and was published on 14 April in collaboration with Pace Gallery.

“[Popovici wrote the press release] to let people believe that I had used the AI of Art Recognition to include the Modigliani painting in my catalogue,” he tells The Art Journal. “I included the work in my catalogue raisonné years before Art Recognition was even aware of the existence of this work. There is no link whatsoever between Art Recognition and my catalogue… This statement is without basis. It is an example of Art Recognition's aggressive marketing strategy, which seeks to gain prominence by publicly disseminating misleading information and using this false information as a platform for a strong public presence.”

Restellini says his lawyer demanded Popovici change the wording of the press release “to remove any ambiguity.”

Popovici complied and republished it on May 22. ‘[It is] the first artwork deemed authentic with the aid of AI image analysis to be separately authenticated and included into the official catalogue raisonné by the leading expert of the artist, who used his own authentication method,’ the edited version read.

Popovici told The Art Journal that, “it was never my intention to mislead anyone… In my correspondence with Restellini, I made it clear that if any member of the press contacted Art Recognition after the first press release, I would emphasise that he had not used Art Recognition’s AI in his research”, she says. “However, Restellini subsequently chose to involve his lawyer, who provided me with an updated version of the press release. I disseminated the updated version promptly. He told me that had I not done so, legal action might have followed.”

She adds that she “strongly disagreed with the characterisation that Art Recognition employs an aggressive marketing strategy… Our aim is not to exploit scholars for publicity but to support the authentication process with our technology”.

Restellini tells The Art Journal that his institute only uses AI in “documentary research to facilitate the management of and searching through the vast collection of documents we possess”. He adds: “We currently consider AI to be ineffective for the actual authentication of works, [but] we employ it and find it very useful as a support tool for certain specific purposes.”

Jeune Femme au Col de Fourrure is just one of 100 newly authenticated paintings added to his catalogue, half of which are in museums, while 15 works included in former catalogues, of which there are five, were downgraded. Restellini says the paintings were ejected “due to lack of definitive evidence attributing them solely to the artist”, or because they could not be located.

While speaking on Is It? The Art Mystery Podcast in May alongside Popovici, Georgina Adam, an editor-at-large at The Art Newspaper, said: “I think it’s going to be a disaster for the owners, because they thought they had a painting that was worth sometimes an enormous amount of money… Are they going to go to court, are they going to contest?”

Amedeo Modigliani, Jeune Femme au Col de Fourrure (Young Woman with a Fur Collar), 1915. Courtesy Art Recognition

However, Restellini tells The Art Journal that their removal “is not a challenge to their authenticity… I explain in my catalogue that I have not included works to which I have not had access to personally review them”.

Restellini says that an article written by The Art Newspaper’s Anna Brady in April about the publication of his catalog included a link to the podcast, which was presented by Noah Charney. “In a podcast, The Art Newspaper's art market editor-at-large Georgina Adam discusses the use of Al authenticity in Restellini's catalogue, alongside Carina Popovici, founder of Art Recognition,” The Art Newspaper reportedly wrote. “You can imagine my reaction as I never used AI for my catalogue!” Restellini told The Art Journal. “When Anna Brady became aware that her article was being used by Mrs. Popovici to introduce misleading information and advertise her company, she had it immediately removed.”

Restellini’s catalog follows previous catalogs published by Arthur Pfannstiel (1956), Ambrogio Ceroni (several revised editions between 1958 and 1972), Osvaldo Patani (1991), and Christian Parisot (1991). During the 30 years he spent compiling it, Restellini was involved in several lawsuits (in most cases he initiated the legal proceedings) and reportedly received death threats after refusing to authenticate works. Ceroni’s tome has, until now, generally been used as the golden standard by the art market, but Restellini has called it ‘incomplete’ and says that Ceroni has become “truly obsolete over time”.

Modigliani, who was Italian and died in 1920 in Paris of tubercular meningitis, aged just 35, is one of the world’s most expensive, and most forged, artists. His Nu couché (1917-18) sold at Christie’s for $170.4 million in 2015, the artist’s record price at auction. Authenticating his work is notoriously challenging because he was known to barter paintings for food, drink or lodging, leaving behind an incomplete and messy provenance trail. His distinctive style, while iconic, is also relatively easy to imitate, so forgeries are rife. The conflicting catalogue raisonnés have sparked expert feuds, further complicating his market. 

Like most industries, AI is increasingly being used in art authentication, but its application is polarising experts, many of whom are sceptical of relying on it to determine authenticity. Art Recognition is just one of a growing number of companies using AI for art authentication. 

‘[If you used a human] you would have to pack your painting, ship it off to a different country for appraisal … then you would have to wait for some months, or sometimes even years, for an answer,’ Popovici told an audience at a TEDxNuremberg talk in 2022 as she live-demonstrated Art Recognition’s tech. ‘Our program needs about three days to learn the characteristics from around 700 training images, and less than five minutes to calculate the probability of the authenticity of an artwork.’

For his part, Restellini adopted the so-called ‘three-legged stool’ concept, initially conceived by George Stout (1897-1978) for conservation practices, for his new catalogue. It relies on collaboration among art historians, scientists and conservators, and is generally accepted in international museum authentication practices. Restellini employed rigorous scientific analysis including spectrometry, infrared and X-ray imaging, stylistic analysis, and documentary analysis to authenticate the Modigliani works, before he cross-referenced the findings using his own connoisseurship. 

On 30 April, Pace hosted a symposium titled ‘From Myth to Method: Reimagining the Catalogue Raisonné’ at its flagship space in New York to celebrate the release of Restellini’s catalogue. As well as the Institut Restellini, the event was supported by Yale University Press, La Société Internationale des Catalogues Raisonnés (CRIS) and Cahiers d'Art Institute, and Puck News. 

Popovici tells The Art Journal that she was initially invited to the symposium but then uninvited in February. The Art Journal has seen a screenshot of an email from Viola McGowan, Pace’s senior director of research and archives, saying: ‘I regret to inform you that due to programming, we’re no longer able to extend the invitation as originally discussed.’

During the symposium, several experts discussed AI’s growing role in helping compile catalogue raisonnés. Atreya Mathur, director of research at the Centre for Art Law, argued that AI works best as a complementary technology. She repeatedly emphasised that AI should assist professionals – whether in image generation, data analysis, authentication, or research – rather than replace human judgment. ‘AI should complement human expertise, not replace it,’ she told the audience. 

As part of Pace’s partnership with the Institut Restellini, the gallery will host a major Modigliani exhibition in New York in 2027. It will be curated by Restellini. In collaboration with the Institut Restellini, Pace handles significant primary and secondary market Modigliani sales. In March at Art Basel Hong Kong, Pace’s booth included Modigliani’s Jeune femme brune (1917-18) for about £10 million.