The gentle Corot did little to help his own cause and would obligingly sign fakes, made by needy artists, reasoning that if a collector was so ignorant as to accept such rubbish as an authentic Corot, he might at least have a real signature for his money.
This cavalier attitude did cause problems for posterity and despite a huge effort and the undisputed significance of Corot in any account of 19th-century European art, prices for his art have suffered.
