A FAKE Van Barnett "Raven"

[ddd]

Whila at Van Barnett and Dellana's home working on the photography
for the book I am preparing on their ART KNIVES, Van gave me a FAKE
copy of one of his "Ravens".

These seem to have been copied in China from a photo!!

The copied fake folders exactly match the original engraving-filework-carvings
of one of his folders, cut for cut...

The copies Van had were bought in China for $1, while the original sells
for nearly $7,000.

See how the "gold inlay" is actually hand painted on, and quite often
not even very accurately (see below)...

And of course, Van's name is not mentioned...

All the best,
David Darom (ddd)

 

[tvandeventer]

Just amazing what people will do! I imagine they copied one by hand and the other 100,000 were cast from that one.

I wonder if Van's income will be affected at all from this plagiarism? I think not, because the guy who would buy one at the convenience store or truck stop for $25 is not likely to be one of Van's regular customers.

Still, from the view of a collector, he might not want to pay $7000 for the original when he sees the cheap knock-offs everywhere he goes. In this case, I don't think that "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery."

Cheers,

TV


Terry Vandeventer
ABS MS

 

[ddd]

As I am sure you can imagine, Terry, Van had the same mixed
feelings at first about the whole issue...

He did manage to get his hands of a few of these fakes and decided
to take the path of "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery".

He also knows that any "Raven" he makes has a "pre-ordered" home
waiting for it the moment it is finished...

All the best,
David Darom (ddd)

 

[Lorien]

in this case, imitation is the sincerest form of scumbaggery:thumbdn:

 

[Joss]

This is certainly wrong ethically, but I don't think it's going to impact VB's desirability in any way. If they were replicating the work and raw materials and selling the piece for 30% less than VB, it would be a real concern, but as it is, it's meaningless.

It may impact VB's ability to strike a distribution deal with a legit knife manufacturer for some type of mass produced edition, but not for the fine art pieces.