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  • Published: 3 March 2022
  • ISBN: 9781473597266
  • Imprint: Vintage Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 208

Portrait of an Unknown Lady




In this dazzling story of art and illusion, secrets and schemes, who is to be trusted - and what is real? From the internationally acclaimed author of Optic Nerve, a New York Times Notable Book 2019

At a hotel in Buenos Aires, a woman checks in under a pseudonym. She wears a black fur shawl and has no luggage. She is alone.

Over the coming days and nights, she tells a story, which begins with a secret shared in a local bath house, revealing art forgery and fraud on a dazzling scale. At its heart is an enigmatic genius who for years forged portraits of the city's elite, before disappearing without trace. It is a story of influence and intrigue, in which nothing is as it seems. We're not to expect 'names, numbers or dates', she cautions, but a more subtle kind of reckoning...

Told in a mordant, irresistible voice and full of sharp surprises, Portrait of an Unknown Lady is a captivating enquiry into what we mean by 'authenticity', in life as in art. At once poised and capricious, elegant and bold, it is a thrilling exploration of the relationships between what is lived, what is told, what is remembered, and what is real.

  • Published: 3 March 2022
  • ISBN: 9781473597266
  • Imprint: Vintage Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 208

About the author

Maria Gainza

María Gainza was born in Buenos Aires, where she still lives. She has worked as a correspondent for The New York Times in Buenos Aires, as well as for ArtNews. For more than ten years she was a regular contributor to the magazine
Artforum and Radar, the cultural supplement of Página/12. She has given courses for artists and art critic workshops and was a co-editor of the collection Los Sentidos (The Senses) on Argentinean art.