[donnerz]

Hi all,

Just a quick public service announcement.

There is an upcoming auction on liveauctioneers by 'First Art Auction' that is a scam seller. They list with photos of authentic pieces, delay the shipping for several months and then send cheap photo prints of the pieces with forged signatures.

It's a guy called Murat Yigit who is running this scam via a business registered in Delaware called 'Light Blue Group LLC' but they are based in Turkey where the fake piece are sent from. His site is www.firstartauction.com previously using the emails [e-mail] [e-mail] and [e-mail] but he has just deleted these email accounts. 

I got stung in their last auction in July and it's proving difficult to get refunded so far. 

I wanted to make you all aware of this scam by Murat Yigit, as there are a bunch of urban art pieces in next weeks auction here - www.liveauctioneers.com/auctioneer/8718/first-art-auction/

Some already have bids but based on my experience and the other reviews, I'd strongly advise avoiding at all costs.

Edit - I'm trying to get Liveauctioneers to step up and pull the upcoming auction in case anyone knows anyone there.

[Adam The Collector]

You can find about 50 auctions a day selling fraudulent art on liveauctioneers... you would need a whole team to make even a small dent. Buy with caution there, they allow any one on the platform, has gone way down hill over the last decade.

[Grillocracy]

Oct 5, 2023 0:58:18 GMT 1 Adam The Collector said:

You can find about 50 auctions a day selling fraudulent art on liveauctioneers... you would need a whole team to make even a small dent. Buy with caution there, they allow any one on the platform, has gone way down hill over the last decade.

It's pretty sad what that site has become. I worked for iCollector.com back in the day when it launched as the first website to bring live online bidding to auction houses. Then when we shut down the business, one of the team members launched LiveAuctioneers and it was also pretty prestigious until I believe he sold the business and now it is basically just a dumping ground for fakes.

[Javier Romero]

I just missed this post and now I'm having a hard time with "First Art Auction" via Liveauctioneers. They took ages to send me the lots and when they arrived the the box was all bend and the prints arrived with heavy buckling. The prints were no properly packed and came all lose and with dirty wrinkled paper sheets between then. So frustrated. 

[Wanchope]

Sorry to hear this Javier and like the OP said Liveauctioneers are to be avoided like the plague. Hopefully they will be able to do something for you, but otherwise we live and learn.

Wishing you all the best

[Javier Romero]

Just also noticed the prints received are fake!

[donnerz]

Sorry to hear the same has happened you Javier. I did manage to get a refund via liveauctioneers after a bit of complaining.

I had to get First art Auction to agree though which took a while.

They were also desperate for me to remove the 1 star review which won't be happening - they said it was all the consigner's fault and they have never seen the work in person but it's all just lies.

Annoyingly they have a blank 5 star review and then 4 x 1 star but LA's shitty weighted system calculates that as a 4.1 rating

[Wanchope]

Woah, that is a massive problem and raise it immediately.

[donnerz]

In case anyone wants a laugh, here's what I got sent vs the auction listing:

[timson]

Rhyton Gallery is another that sells fakes on there. The Art's World too, but they label theirs as "in the style of" to get around LiveAuctioneer's (lax) T&C. 

[┏( ͡❛ ͜ʖ ͡❛)┛ EnS]

C'mon "in the style of" has been forever known as = fake/copied/replica

[┏( ͡❛ ͜ʖ ͡❛)┛ EnS]

Nice speckletone WHITE paper! Sorry for the bad experience. LiveAuctioneers should have this fixed in no time.

[Blue]

I saw an auction with a number of nice pieces on LiveAuctioneers and with a quick cross check found all the images were ripped from artsy sellers… notified them that it was a fraudulent auction and it still went ahead with folk spending thousands. Sad to see. Buyers beware.

[Collection 1]

I've been scammed too. I received a cheap photocopy of a Katherine Bradford print with a forged signature. I'm still waiting from Liveauctionneers to get a refund.

[michaeldee]

Good god that fake is horrible! I truly hope you get your money back quickly and I hope you will press live auctioneers to ban this seller and finally clean up their act with vetting the huge amount of fakes on their site. I have complained to LA about this in the past but they never do a thing. I was watching several lots in this sale, knowing the sale was a sham. Unfortunately, many lots found buyers who thought they were getting big discounts on market prices. Worse still is that these ridiculously low sales prices get posted on the internet, which ultimately dilutes the market value of legit prints. Bottom line for me about all bidding platforms like LA, Artsy, Invaluable, etc...if you notice sales from small unknown auction houses coming out of Delaware, stay far away.

[Javier Romero]

Nov 16, 2023 7:51:30 GMT 1 michaeldee said:

Good god that fake is horrible! I truly hope you get your money back quickly and I hope you will press live auctioneers to ban this seller and finally clean up their act with vetting the huge amount of fakes on their site. I have complained to LA about this in the past but they never do a thing. I was watching several lots in this sale, knowing the sale was a sham. Unfortunately, many lots found buyers who thought they were getting big discounts on market prices. Worse still is that these ridiculously low sales prices get posted on the internet, which ultimately dilutes the market value of legit prints. Bottom line for me about all bidding platforms like LA, Artsy, Invaluable, etc...if you notice sales from small unknown auction houses coming out of Delaware, stay far away.

I got three pieces during that same auction by First Art Auction / Liveauctioneers and all of them are fake with forged signatures. Liveauctioneers is giving me a hard time to refund me even sending them the photos showing that even the description that was given during the auction doesn't match the item that I just received.

[michaeldee]

Nov 16, 2023 16:00:37 GMT 1 Javier Romero said:

Nov 16, 2023 7:51:30 GMT 1 michaeldee said:

Good god that fake is horrible! I truly hope you get your money back quickly and I hope you will press live auctioneers to ban this seller and finally clean up their act with vetting the huge amount of fakes on their site. I have complained to LA about this in the past but they never do a thing. I was watching several lots in this sale, knowing the sale was a sham. Unfortunately, many lots found buyers who thought they were getting big discounts on market prices. Worse still is that these ridiculously low sales prices get posted on the internet, which ultimately dilutes the market value of legit prints. Bottom line for me about all bidding platforms like LA, Artsy, Invaluable, etc...if you notice sales from small unknown auction houses coming out of Delaware, stay far away.

I got three pieces during that same auction by First Art Auction / Liveauctioneers and all of them are fake with forged signatures. Liveauctioneers is giving me a hard time to refund me even sending them the photos showing that even the description that was given during the auction doesn't match the item that I just received.

Sorry this happened to you as well. Good luck with your refund. If you haven't already done so...please leave negative feedback for this seller.

[Javier Romero]

Wow, First Art Auction / Liveauctioneers is back to scam people. Be aware, they are selling counterfeit art with forged signatures!