The previous poster laid it out pretty well. Virgil also deliberately misrepresents the pieces as less valuable than they are, such as the copy that wasn't a copy, so that he can afford them. He obviously is very rich in his own right, but not at the level where he can just write a check for eight million every time he runs across something extrardinary. Plus he enjoys the game, the win.
Billy does it for money, which Virgil pays him. Virgil just wants the art. There's no profit financially, for Virgil, but the original owners are being defrauded of millions.
It's a pretty despicable crime. These things ought to be in museums (and IRL, the pieces used for the film mostly are), not locked away for one man's selfish pleasure. Then there's the loss to the owners of money they rightfully should have had. They are usually quite rich themselves and will not be hurting as a result, but he's still stealing from them. And they may not all be rich either.
It's entirely possible this kind of thing happens in the art world all the time. Who would know? Sometimes even the world's leading experts can't agree on whether or not a piece was done by a particular artist.
"Oh, dear. Mr. Dictionary seems to have deserted us again."
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morganseer
9 years ago
These pieces would not have ended up in a museum, but in someone's private collection. Although a legitimate owner would be more likely to allow a museum to display them periodically.
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