To combat what it called the “scourge” of art forgeries, the government of Morocco announced last month plans to draft new legislation that cracks down on counterfeiters of contemporary paintings and sculptures, as well as other cultural property. Moroccan Minister of Youth, Culture and Communication, Mohamed Mehdi Bensaid, said the goal is to “establish a mechanism aimed at supporting the promotion of Moroccan artists and strengthening their presence on an international scale,” noting that “counterfeiting affects the credibility of artists, gallery owners and Moroccan art in general.”

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The legislative package aims to improve detection systems, impose harsher penalties that include prison terms and not just monetary awards and better regulate auction houses. The laws of a distant nation might seem of little concern to U.S. citizens, but Morocco is one of many countries whose economies heavily depend on tourism, and travelers there and elsewhere abroad naturally want to be certain that artworks they purchase are not counterfeit.

The Moroccan art market itself is small, estimated by officials in the country at perhaps $2.5 million, but paintings by its national artists have become popular in other countries, which has led to forgeries appearing in galleries, auction houses and online.

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Morocco joins a growing international effort to fight fakes and counterfeit cultural property. “Most countries in the world have rules against fake and forged artworks,” Massimo Sterpi, an intellectual property lawyer in Rome and the co-author of The Art Collecting Legal Handbook, told Observer. Those rules may lay out standard prison times for those who sell inauthentic cultural property, including dealers and auctioneers, and for the counterfeiters themselves.

In Greece, for instance, forgers and fraudulent sellers face incarceration and monetary damages (the return of the price paid and even the psychological stress........

© Observer