Authenticity of desk found using lasers

Press, 23 September 1983, Page 17

Authenticity of desk found using lasers

NZPA London Scotland Yard used laser photography techniques to establish the authenticity of a 204-year-old desk, boosting its expected auction value to $340,000, the auction house said.

Christies will auction the desk in December for an unidentified owner.

A spokesman for the London auction house, Mr John Herbert, said doubt existed about the desk, believed to be the work of the French court cabinet maker, J. H. Riesener, because an inventory number could not be seen. At Scotland Yard, a senior scientist, Mr Kenneth Creer, said scientists used argon ion laser radiation photography equipment to examine the desk.

“Photographing the desk was completely outside our usual area but I cannot say what we normally

use the equipment on, as the less criminals know about our capabilities the more likely we are to catch them out,” Mr Creer said.

Under the blue-green light of the laser equipment, the inventory number, 2929, showed up as black where the ink had stained the wood, he said. Christies research showed that Riesener delivered the desk on March 18, 1779, to Madame Sophie de France, the sixth daughter of King Louis XV, for her apartment in Versailles.

Scotland Yard billed Christies for the tests, Mr Creer said. He declined to reveal the amount. “It was a special case as we have the only equipment in Britain that can do that sort of detective work but it is not usually our business to work for auction houses,” he said.