To feed a booming market, dealer admits he embellished works signed by a well known artist

An Adelaide art dealer was found guilty yesterday of selling forged Aboriginal paintings - the first successful Australian prosecution for fraud in the booming market in indigenous people's art.

John O'Loughlin, 54, was placed on a three-year good behaviour bond, after he sold dot paintings signed by one of the most respected native artists, Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri, to two art dealers.

O'Loughlin admitted that the paintings were not "wholly" the work of Possum, whose canvases have sold for thousands of dollars.

Philip Hall, chief executive of the National Indigenous Arts Advocacy Association, called Possum's work an "absolutely outstanding" part of the $A2.5bn (£930m) aboriginal art market.

"What they did to that poor man is absolutely disgraceful," Mr Hall said. "They've used and abused him for their own personal financial gain."

More than 6,000 aboriginal artists work in the remote and arid central region, known as the "dead centre". Fraudsters have long exploited such artists' lack of knowledge of copyright law.

They have also played on collectors' ignorance of the symbolism of authentic dot paintings.

O'Loughlin claimed in court in Sydney that Possum had made him an honorary "cousin".

He said that after they ate kangaroo intestines together, Possum asked for his help. "Only on that one occasion did he say to me, you can do the dotting - you are my cousin," O'Loughlin said. "I took it then that I could and he never objected to it after that."

O'Loughlin admitted to embellishing and "finishing off" paintings by Mr Possum. The paintings all carried Mr Possum's signature, but the artist told the court he signed the work when he was drunk and intimidated by the art dealer.

Traditional aboriginal bark paintings first became popular with a white audience in the 1950s, before the Papunya Tula people cultivated a collectable contemporary style with innovative "dot painting" in the 1970s. Such works have more than tripled in value during the last decade.

But much "indigenous art" is fake - imported from Asian sweatshops or mass-produced by backpackers paid to be "dot painters".

Questions of authenticity are complicated by the fact that it is common practice for the families of Australian desert artists to do the "dotting" or "filling in" of a work, which is then signed by the artist.

A senior indigenous painter is often the custodian of a symbolic "story" featured in a painting, but will delegate its visual depiction to younger relatives.

"The authenticity question is a complicated one, because a person may put a name on a work if they own the story even if they haven't done any of the production," said Ken Polk, professor of criminology at Melbourne University. "In some aboriginal settings what is critical is the ownership of the story, not the production of the work."

Brenda Crost, curator of indigenous art at the Art Gallery of Western Australia in Perth, said there had always been collaboration, but the western art world craved individual stars. "Artwork has to have a single author because it is more valuable," she said.

Although native-art forgeries were "rampant" in the past, aborigines have wised up, said Cathie Craigie, the director of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts board.

Last month, Pro Hart, 72, another of Australia's most recognisable aboriginal painters, called on police to investigate the theft and forgery of his work in the past 30 years.

Hart now marks all his paintings with a coating detectable by a hi-tech scanner. Other artists try to protect their interests by selling solely through 105 non-profit aboriginal community art centres.

But Ms Craigie said a system of labelling to prove authenticity launched last June was patchy because it depended on artists from far-flung places coming forward to register.

Australia's western-derived legal system has trouble dealing with fraud in aboriginal art, Ms Crost said.

"Copyright laws relate to individual artists, whereas many of the works ripped off are communal property. The intellectual property of the work belongs to the community and that's why it's so destructive for many artists. They feel they've failed to look after the stories that have been handed down to them."

"There is a story attached to our art," said Mr Hall. "This is the thing that people don't understand - they are not just looking at a painting and buying a painting, they are buying a story."

Others who ran into trouble

Elizabeth Durack Admired white artist, aged 81, who revealed she had created a black alter ego, Eddie Burrup, in whose name she painted indigenous art. She went on doing so until her death from cancer last year, arguing that there was no deception. Some senior men from the Nyoongar people supported her, believing she was possessed by the spirit of an aboriginal artist.

Kathleen Petyarre Indigenous artist who won the 1996 National Aboriginal Art Prize in Australia. The media alleged that her Welsh-born boyfriend helped paint her winning work. An inquiry by the Museum of the Northern Territory exonerated her.

Mudrooroo Won plaudits and literary prizes across Australia for his six novels and four volumes of poetry. But in 1996 the 57-year-old aboriginal author was unmasked by his sister, Betty Polgaze, as Colin Johnson, an Australian with no aboriginal blood and an Afro-American grandfather.

Wanda Koolmatrie Aboriginal author who won an award for best first work by a woman writer in 1995 with her autobiography, My Own Sweet Time. Two years of being mysteriously unavailable for interviews followed, before it was revealed "she" was Leon Carmen, a white middle-aged Australian. The former taxi driver accused critics of discriminating against whites in favour of aboriginal and immigrant writers.

Sakshi Anmatyerre Highly regarded indigenous painter, who sold works to the Sultan of Brunei and the actor Paul Hogan. Three years ago, it was revealed that this talented artist was a Calcutta Indian, Farley French, who took a new name in 1992.

Useful links:

Australian National Indigenous Arts Advocacy Association

The Art Gallery of Western Australia

Australian Institute of Criminology art crime conference, 1999