Investigation of craquelure patterns in oil paintings using precise 3D morphological analysis for art authentication

Abstract

The development of scientific technology for art authentication has elicited multidimensional evidence to distinguish forgeries from original artwork. Here, we analyzed the three-dimensional morphology of cracks that contain information, such as the painting features of artworks, using optical coherence tomography. The forgeries were produced by an expert from original oil paintings with cracks that occur owing to paint drying, canvas aging, and physical damage. Parameters, such as shape, width, and depth, were compared based on the cross-sectional images of the original and fake cracks. The original cracks were rectangular and inverted, but the fake cracks were relatively simple inverted triangles. The original cracks were as deep as the thickness of the upper layer and mostly were “thin/deep” or “wide/shallow”. The fake cracks were observed to be “’thin/shallow” or “wide/deep”. This study aims to improve the understanding of crack characteristics and promote the development of techniques for determining art authenticity.