Lennon's Art Comes To Triangle

Click here to see a gallery of John Lennon's artwork that is on display at the Sheraton Hotel

Thousands of pieces of John Lennon's artwork -- some originals and some reproductions -- arrived in Chapel Hill on Thursday, more than 20 years after the artist's death.

From 5 p.m. Friday until 6 p.m. Sunday, more than 100 individual pieces of artwork by the famous singer and musician will be on display at the The Sheraton Chapel Hill Hotel.

All the artwork comes from the estate of Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono, and is distributed through Ono's Bag One Arts Inc. The exhibit includes some original drawings and lithographs produced and signed by Lennon himself before his death in 1980.

There is no admission fee at the exhibit, although there is a suggested $2 donation to go to Children's Surgery International.

But the majority of the exhibit consists of posthumous reproductions of Lennon's artwork, with 300 copies of each print created and sold to the public, said Lynne Clifford, director of Bag One Arts.

The reproductions come in the form of etchings, lithographs and serigraphs created from original Lennon drawings. Some of the reproductions are original Lennon drawings with color added after his death by Ono.

Larry Schwartz, the director of the traveling exhibit, said the reproductions, when combined with the original works, will give Lennon's fans the chance to appreciate his nonmusical work.

"When John died, Yoko made a pledge that the world would know him as an artist," Schwartz said. "Art was his first love."

But Gary Arseneau, an art gallery owner and author of two books on art fraud, said the exhibit is deceptive because all pieces of art are presented as the artwork of John Lennon and not as reproductions of his work.

"People are showing up thinking that they're seeing original artwork," Arseneau said. "They're going to see 91 objects of fake work."

Schwartz said the reproduced lithographs, serigraphs and etchings are done by Atelier GF, a Toronto-based graphics company. But Schwartz said buyers are clearly informed that each piece is a reproduction of Lennon's original work.

"People aren't stupid," he said. "They know they aren't buying originals. We don't have returns, and we don't get complaints."

The price of each reproduction ranges from $700 to $8,000 per print.

The certificate of authenticity given to each buyer states that the pieces were completed by an outside graphics company, but it does not use the word reproduction.

Timothy Riggs, assistant director for collections of the Ackland Art Museum, said reproductions of a famous artists' work are common throughout art history.

Riggs compared reproductions to covering a well-known song in which the reproduction could be nearly identical to the original or a reinterpretation of the original.

Riggs said there is no uniform way to evaluate the quality and value of a reproduction, and he advised patrons of the exhibit to make their own evaluations based upon the facts.

"If you're attending the exhibit, you should take your time, look at the work and read the information behind its creation," Riggs said. "Then it's just a matter of case-by-case judgement."

The Arts & Entertainment Editor can be reached at artsdesk@unc.edu.