All that glitters A story of friendship, fraud, and fine art

Orlando Whitfield

Large print - 2024

"Orlando Whitfield and Inigo Philbrick met in 2006 at London's Goldsmiths University where they became best friends. By 2007 they had started I & O Fine Art. Orlando would eventually set up his own gallery and watch as Inigo quickly immersed himself in a world of private jets and multimillion-dollar deals for major clients. Inigo seemed brilliant, but underneath the extravagant façade, his complicated financial schemes were unraveling. With debt, lawsuits, and court summonses piling up, Inigo went into a tailspin of lies and subterfuge. At around the same time, Orlando would himself experience a nervous breakdown and leave the art world for good. By 2019 things had spiraled enough out of control for Inigo to flee to the remot...e island nation of Vanuatu, 300 miles west of Fiji. Within a year, he was arrested by the FBI and extradited to America, where he was sentenced to seven years in prison for having committed more than $86 million in fraud. All That Glitters is at once a shocking and compulsive story of ambition and downfall, a cautionary tale, and an intimate portrait of friendship and its loss."--

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LARGE PRINT/709.22/Whitfield
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1st Floor New Large Print Shelf LARGE PRINT/709.22/Whitfield (NEW SHELF) Due Mar 3, 2025
1st Floor New Large Print Shelf LARGE PRINT/709.22/Whitfield (NEW SHELF) Due Feb 26, 2025
Subjects
Genres
Biographies
True crime stories
Large print books
Published
Thorndike, Maine : Center Point Large Print 2024.
Language
English
Main Author
Orlando Whitfield (author)
Edition
Center Point Large Print edition
Item Description
Regular print version previously published by Pantheon Books.
Physical Description
446 pages (large print) ; 23 cm
ISBN
9798891643208
Contents unavailable.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Former art dealer Whitfield skillfully blends memoir and true crime in this immersive account of his relationship with art fraudster Inigo Philbrick. Whitfield first met Philbrick at Goldsmiths University in 2006. The two became fast friends, launching an art dealership together in 2007. Early on, Whitfield noticed the charismatic Philbrick's need to "always be in possession of one trump card," which often led him to tell small lies to close deals or secure relationships. After a few years in business together, the pair began working separately but remained close, and Philbrick's deceptions started to balloon--he began inventing fictitious buyers and selling multiple shares of individual pieces at wildly inflated prices. After Whitfield's substance abuse and mental illness led him to retire, he learned about the scale of Philbrick's schemes; in 2019, with investigators closing in, Philbrick made headlines for fleeing to the island of Vanuatu to seek asylum. He was eventually arrested by the FBI and extradited to the U.S., where he pled guilty to defrauding collectors out of more than $80 million. Whitfield vividly captures the surreal contours of the art world--where buyers spend hefty sums on paintings made from M&Ms--and convincingly highlights how its absurdity helped cover Philbrick's tracks for so long. The result is a rollicking up-close look at a fascinating con. Agent: John Ash, CAA. (Aug.)

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review

A juicy inside look at the meteoric rise and fall of an ambitious young art dealer. In this debut book, Whitfield recounts how he met Inigo Philbrick in art school at Goldsmiths, University of London, in 2006. Years before, Philbrick had cunningly parlayed an internship at the prestigious White Cube gallery into his own multimillion-dollar transatlantic art dealership. The author engagingly chronicles his friend's ability to "inveigl[e] himself into the upper echelons" of the art world, trading in blue-chip art and treating the market "like a quantitative analyst." Eventually, the cocksure operator went from simply flouting ethical boundaries to breaking legal ones, double-selling artworks and creating false value. In 2022, he was convicted of $86 million in fraud and sentenced to seven years in prison. Whitfield calls himself Nick Carraway to Philbrick's Jay Gatsby, and this glimpse into the art world of the super wealthy, "commerce dressed up as culture," helps make his tale compulsively readable. The author broadens his critique from that of one unscrupulous player to the whole system of the modern art market, with its lack of regulations and transparency, used by collectors as a "portable way to park money," their artworks "easily stored in tax havens like Switzerland to avoid the prying eyes of, say, divorce lawyers or tax inspectors." Whitfield firmly indicts the "ethically grey trading practices" cloaked in art world "discretion"--i.e., deliberate obfuscation--as the modus operandi of the international art market. With exceptional candor and insight, the author is a capable guide as he introduces readers to consequential artists, dealers, curators, art philosophers, and conservators, as well as the vast potential for mischief. If the art world's primary currency is access--to art, capital, and buzz--this insider's account offers readers an enticing entry. A self-described "failed art dealer" spills the tea on his captivating, insular world. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.