What is Oswald el falsificador Based On?

“Oswald el falsificador” is based on the true story of Oswald Aulestia Bach, a Catalan artist who became one of Spain’s most notorious art forgers. The 2022 documentary chronicles his real-life involvement in Operation Artist, an international art forgery investigation led by the FBI, Mossos d’Esquadra, and Italian Carabinieri.

The Real-Life Subject: Oswald Aulestia Bach

Born in Barcelona in 1946, Oswald Aulestia Bach learned the fundamentals of art from his father, sculptor Salvador Aulestia. This apprenticeship became the foundation for a career that would eventually blur the lines between legitimate artistry and criminal forgery.

Oswald initially worked alongside his father in Italy, representing him to wealthy clients and multinational corporations. When his father abandoned a lucrative project, Oswald faced a choice: lose the lifestyle he’d grown accustomed to or find alternative ways to maintain it. He chose the latter, beginning by forging his own father’s works before expanding to replicate pieces by modern masters including Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dalí, Marc Chagall, and Antoni Tàpies.

The documentary captures Oswald as an eccentric personality—hidden behind mirrored glasses and a signature mustache, dressed in a cap emblazoned with “Everything is a fraud.” His philosophy embraced living outside conventional rules, describing himself as a “pirate” who prioritized experience over conformity.

Operation Artist: The Investigation That Changed Everything

At the documentary’s core lies Operation Artist, a coordinated international investigation that spanned multiple countries and law enforcement agencies. In 2008, U.S. federal authorities indicted seven individuals in an art forgery scheme that had generated over $5 million in counterfeit sales, primarily through online platforms like eBay.

The operation represented collaboration between the FBI, Spain’s Mossos d’Esquadra (Catalan police), and Italy’s Carabinieri. Oswald emerged as one of the scheme’s cornerstones, responsible for creating the forgeries that accomplices Elio Bonfiglioli and Michael Zabrin would authenticate and distribute through art galleries and online marketplaces.

The investigation revealed a sophisticated network. Zabrin, an art dealer from the Chicago suburb of Northbrook, Illinois, helped move the counterfeit works into American collections. The “limited edition” prints featured forged signatures and fabricated numbering that deceived collectors, some of whom were celebrities including Madonna, Sylvester Stallone, Luis Miguel, and Ricky Martin.

After years eluding capture, Oswald was extradited to the United States and spent nine months in a federal prison in Chicago. The documentary depicts harsh conditions—windowless cells, complete isolation for four months, zero hours of sunlight daily. Accomplice Elio Bonfiglioli found imprisonment so devastating he attempted suicide multiple times.

The Documentary’s Creation and Approach

Director Kike Maíllo, who won a Goya Award for his science fiction debut “Eva,” initially set out to create a fictional film about forgers and con artists. During research, he discovered articles about Oswald and reached out through social media. What began as material for fiction transformed into documentary when Maíllo recognized the power of Oswald’s actual personality.

“The most exciting thing is his character,” Maíllo explained in interviews. “It’s like someone so crazy, seductive and grotesque. Excessive and intelligent. All that in one person.” The filmmaker spent years building trust with Oswald, gradually convincing him to reveal details of his operations, philosophy, and the intricate mechanics of living outside the law.

Filming took place across three countries—the United States (including Chicago and Miami), Italy (Venice and Florence), and Spain (primarily Barcelona). The production team interviewed art experts, journalists, judges, police officers from multiple jurisdictions, lawyers, appraisers, gallery owners, family members, a court translator, and Oswald’s psychotherapist. This multi-perspective approach creates a comprehensive portrait that questions how much of Oswald’s narrative represents truth versus self-mythologizing.

The documentary deliberately invokes Orson Welles’ 1973 film “F for Fake,” which explored Hungarian forger Elmyr de Hory. Both films examine how forgery challenges fundamental concepts: What makes art authentic? Who decides value? Where does creativity end and crime begin?

Themes: Truth, Lies, and the Nature of Art

Beyond recounting criminal history, the documentary probes philosophical questions about authenticity in art and life. Oswald’s story becomes a lens for examining how reality and legend intertwine, particularly when the protagonist actively crafts his own mythology.

The film reflects on original versus copy—a tension embodied in Oswald himself. He possessed genuine artistic talent, creating his own works in a recognizable pop art style. Yet he devoted that skill to mimicking others, raising questions: If the technical execution matches the original artist’s, what truly differentiates authentic from counterfeit? Is the value in the paint and canvas, or in the signature and provenance?

Oswald’s own perspective adds complexity. He noted that collectors who discovered they’d purchased forgeries rarely reported them: “Those who I sold to preferred to keep the painting rather than sue me. Because if they kept it they made millions, if they reported it the painting was no longer worth anything.” This observation indicts the art market itself, suggesting that financial speculation often trumps aesthetic appreciation.

The documentary also explores Oswald’s self-awareness about his own narrative. Throughout filming, uncertainty persists about how much of his story represents fact versus embellishment. His personality—simultaneously charming and manipulative, philosophical and self-aggrandizing—makes him an unreliable narrator of his own legend.

Production Details and Recognition

“Oswald el falsificador” emerged as Filmin’s first original documentary production, created in partnership with Playtime Movies, Sábado Películas, and El Terrat (The Mediapro Studio), with participation from Spanish Television (TVE), Catalan Television (TV3), ICEC, and ICAA. The screenplay was written by Marta-Libertad Castillo, with cinematography by Rubén Collado and music by Marc Timón.

Released on September 30, 2022, simultaneously in theaters and on the Filmin streaming platform, the documentary became the most-watched documentary in Filmin’s history. It received a nomination for Best Documentary at the 37th Goya Awards in 2023, Spain’s most prestigious film honors. The film also earned a Gaudí Award nomination for Best Documentary from the Catalan Film Academy.

The documentary runs 100 minutes and also exists as a three-episode docuseries format that aired on TV3 in Catalonia and subsequently on Spanish national television.

The Art Market and Forgery Context

Oswald’s operations took place within a broader ecosystem of art forgery that represents a persistent challenge for museums, galleries, and collectors. Art historian Harry Bellet noted that former Metropolitan Museum director Thomas Hoving estimated 40% of that museum’s works were fakes. The often-cited statistic that French painter Camille Corot completed 3,000 works in his lifetime, yet 5,000 “Corot” paintings exist in the United States alone, illustrates the scale of forgery in art markets.

The documentary contextualizes Oswald’s techniques. He explained that medieval and Renaissance works prove extremely difficult to forge due to period-specific materials—pigments, canvases, aging techniques. However, modern and contemporary art from 1900 onward presents fewer technical barriers. “I don’t talk about easy or difficult, but rather the time factor,” he stated. “There are works that take four or five minutes to reproduce and others a month. A Miró, a Klein or a Tàpies are easy. In one morning I’ll make you 20 Tàpies.”

His approach focused less on perfect replication and more on creating what he called “aquello que hace confundir al perito”—that which confuses the expert. This involved understanding not just artistic style but also the authentication process, the expectations of appraisers, and the psychology of collectors who want to believe they’ve discovered a genuine work.

Oswald After Prison: The Ironies of Fame

Following his release and return to Spain, Oswald experienced an ironic reversal. The notoriety from his criminal past increased demand for his original works. Collectors now sought pieces signed “Oswald Aulestia,” creating a market for authentic fakes by a famous forger. Some artists even began forging Oswald’s own work—the counterfeiter became the counterfeited.

The documentary captures Oswald at approximately 76 years old, recovering from a stroke and multiple surgeries, yet maintaining the vivacious personality and philosophical bent that characterized his younger years. His participation in the film itself represents a form of performance, another layer in his decades-long practice of constructing and presenting identity.

He wrote a memoir titled “El falsificador: El testimonio de uno de los mayores falsificadores de arte de la historia” with his ex-wife Neus Casablanca, further blurring autobiography and fiction. In interviews promoting the book and documentary, he maintained his provocative stance: “Real? Nothing is real. Memories aren’t real, they’re part of the past and exist in the mind.”

The Documentary’s Lasting Questions

“Oswald el falsificador” succeeds not by providing definitive answers but by sustaining ambiguity. It documents a verifiable criminal case—indictments exist, prison time was served, stolen art was recovered. Yet it simultaneously questions how we construct narratives about reality, how personality can function as performance, and whether redemption or rehabilitation even apply to someone who never expressed remorse for his crimes.

The film’s power lies in this tension. Oswald remains charismatic and entertaining while discussing actions that defrauded collectors and undermined legitimate artists. Law enforcement officials recount the investigation with pride, yet acknowledge the disproportionate harshness of U.S. incarceration for non-violent property crimes. Art experts explain the technical details of forgery detection while acknowledging the market’s complicity in preferring comfortable lies to uncomfortable truths.

By grounding itself in Oswald’s documented biography while allowing space for his mythmaking, the documentary becomes a meditation on how we distinguish authentic from fabricated in art, identity, and memory itself.

Key Production Facts:

• Director: Kike Maíllo (Goya Award winner for “Eva”)
• Subject: Oswald Aulestia Bach, born 1946 in Barcelona
• Release Date: September 30, 2022
• Runtime: 100 minutes (feature) / 3 episodes (series)
• Filming Locations: Barcelona, Venice, Florence, Chicago, Miami
• Recognition: Nominated for Best Documentary at 2023 Goya Awards
• Distribution: Filmin (streaming) and theatrical release
• Criminal Case: U.S. federal indictment 2008, nine months imprisonment in Chicago
• Forged Artists: Picasso, Miró, Dalí, Chagall, Tàpies, among others
• Investigation: Operation Artist (FBI, Mossos d’Esquadra, Carabinieri)

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Oswald Aulestia Bach a real person?

Yes, Oswald Aulestia Bach is a real Catalan artist born in 1946. His involvement in art forgery and subsequent prosecution by U.S. federal authorities are documented facts, including a 2008 CNN report on the indictments in the Operation Artist case.

How accurate is the documentary about the forgery operation?

The documentary incorporates verified elements including court records, law enforcement interviews, and participation from Oswald’s actual accomplices (Elio Bonfiglioli and Michael Zabrin). However, Oswald himself functions as an unreliable narrator, and the filmmakers acknowledge uncertainty about which anecdotes represent literal truth versus embellishment.

What happened to the forged artworks?

Many forged pieces sold through the operation remain in private collections. As Oswald noted, collectors who suspected they owned forgeries often chose not to report them, as authentication as fake would eliminate the artwork’s resale value. The documentary explores how this dynamic perpetuates forgery markets.

Did the documentary lead to new investigations?

While the film documents past crimes, it premiered after Oswald had served his sentence and returned to Spain. At the time of production, Oswald maintained he still faced potential legal issues in the United States, though no new charges resulted from the documentary’s release.