The Epidemic of Fake Bronze Subway surrounds in the United States – Part One: An Auction that Flops

This series of three articles develops an aspect dealt with in the book Guimard L’Art nouveau du metro, published in 2012 by La Vie du Rail. In it, we use the terms “old” or “authentic” Paris metro surrounds, “copies” and “fakes”, which must first be explained. We consider as “authentic” or “old” the surrounds and ædicula of the Paris metro whose elements have been edited according to Guimard’s models from the creation of the metro in 1900 until after the First World War in 1922. However, the Guimard metro entrances currently present on the Parisian network are only partly authentic because many of them have undergone more or less complete restorations since 1976, which consisted in replacing missing elements with copies. These were reissued first by overmoulding, then with new moulds with exact dimensions. It is with these copies of elements that in recent years the RATP (the Paris metro company) has supplied complete surrounds to metro companies in various foreign cities (Lisbon, Mexico City, Chicago and Moscow). These are copies of surrounds, but not “fakes” in the legal sense of the word, since there was never any question of passing them off as old Parisian surrounds. However, we will look at a series of copies of surrounds that are indeed fakes because they were created with the intention of selling them as authentic.

In March 2019 we were contacted by the representative in France of the American branch of a well-known British auction house: Bonhams. They suggested that we give our opinion on an “exceptional Guimard ensemble” and that we write the presentation leaflet for its sale scheduled for June 2019 in New York. Sensing what it could be about and contrary to our usual practice, we responded favourably to this request. We then received confirmation that it was indeed a new Parisian subway surround that was being sold in the United States.

Portal of the subway surround sold by Bonhams New York in June 2019. Photo Bonhams.

Section of a railing of the subway surround sold by Bonhams New York in June 2019. Photo Bonhams.

As we are beginning to have some experience with the “new-parisian-subway-surrounds-being-sold-in-the-U.S.A. ” and not wishing to show our hand at this point, we immediately asked Bonhams New York for more information.

The first thing we wanted to clarify was the nature of the metal used for the shaped parts of the surround. As we expected, we were told that they were made of bronze. This fact alone implied that these pieces had been overmoulded and cast in a material other than the original pieces (1) and that the railing was therefore a copy.

We also asked for additional photos, focusing on points where we were pretty sure we would find something to comment on. The photos provided to us supported the copy hypothesis by showing that some of the modelled pieces had a different aspect from what they should have and that their assembly suffered from errors and approximations.

In addition to the requested photos, Bonhams Auction House provided us with two documents:

– a copy of an inventory, undated, written by Mr. Dean P. Taylor in Fresno, California, and addressed to Mr. Joe Walters in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

– a certificate of authenticity drawn up in English by the French expert Mr Nicolaas Borsje on 9 July 1993. It refers to a metro surround purchased by Mr Arnold P. Mikulay in 1991.

In order to facilitate the description of an uncovered surround, we recall below the names we have given to its constituent parts:

1- pillars (cast iron).

2- arches (cast iron).

3- upper sign holder (cast iron).

4- lower sign holder (cast iron).

5- stirrups (cast iron).

6- helmets (cast iron).

7- crests (cast iron).

8- signaling bowls (originally in blown-moulded glass then replaced by moulded  synthetic material).

Elements of an uncovered Paris subway surround by Guimard. Author’s drawing.

9- badges (cast iron).

10- hoops (cast iron).

11- middle posts (cast iron).

12- corner posts (cast iron).

13- flames (U-shaped irons made of rolled steel, cut and bent at the ends).

14- irons (U-shaped irons made of rolled steel).

15 & 16- blades (rolled steel bars).

17- base stones (Comblanchien).

18- sign (enamelled lava).

Elements of an uncovered Paris subway surround by Guimard. Author’s drawing.

So we sent Bonhams Auction House the following sales pitch: